


Easy to Find - C2 - It Doesn't Mean Reality Is Mean

by Moiderah



Series: Easy to Find - SayakaQuest 2 [4]
Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Adulthood, Coming of Age, F/F, F/M, Future Fic, Illustrations, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Next Generation, Nonbinary Character, Original Character(s), Other, POV Second Person, Parenthood, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Queer Themes, Quests, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-04
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:12:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26270164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moiderah/pseuds/Moiderah
Summary: The thing they feared has happened, and Sayaka and Kyouko have to cope. All the while, Rin plots, going for a strike at the core of Mitakihara.All while the Incubators plot overhead.
Relationships: Akemi Homura/Kaname Madoka, Miki Sayaka/Sakura Kyouko
Series: Easy to Find - SayakaQuest 2 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1892605
Comments: 5
Kudos: 4





	1. It'll Be Alright (Fuck You)

**Author's Note:**

> Content Warning: SQ2 involves intense violence, themes of parenthood, systemic oppression, strong language, bigotry and more mature themes, considering that the main cast is now twenty years older. They're adults and they will act like adults.
> 
> There are events in this story that will be thematically and emotionally distressing.
> 
> SayakaQuest 2 is a story about families enduring through intense hardships.
> 
> Also yes, there are illustrations in this story. I drew these ages ago; I'm not leaving them unposted.
> 
> Similarly one of the main villains is a transphobic cult leader, with all that entails.

Your name is Minako. And you just made a mistake. Now, you've fucked up before. You absolutely have. But they're normally not like this. They're usually not as bad as this one. The first thing you felt was an overwhelming wave of grief. It felt like your heart was being torn out of your chest. Like someone took your soul and ground it to dust.  
  
You feel screaming. A wave of red and blue and hatred and despair. You are immediately set adrift in a sea of screams, hurled into a yawning ocean of deep blue and blood-red that there's no way you can possibly ever escape from as the water fills your lungs and flames lick your face and you can feel a yawning pit underneath the waves.  
  
Suddenly, a hand grips your ankle as at the bottom of the ocean, millions of hands reach up and up and _up and up_ and you feel yourself choking. A pair of bright pink eyes lay at the bottom, two massive glowing spheres of _hate_ staring above, cat-smile turning into a yawning maw, teeth lining an impossible mouth as its back opens up.  
  
You realize that this is Kyubey. You _know_ that this cat-thing isn't its true form. And you think you glimpse it as the back opens to rows of teeth and an infinite cosmic void.  
  


  
Except, you're not there yet. A lifeline pulls you back. A pair of other hands, one red and one blue, grab your shoulders. The blackened claws of smoke and wisp and hate threaten to drag you down. You can feel it trying to pull you in, to suck you dry.  
  
But then the hands on your shoulders pull you. You see the maw grasping at you, a garbled scream as you grip the hands pulling you and then-  
  
-you cut the line. You fall flat on your ass in the alleyway, and your _soul_ falls right towards the concrete. Before it can land, your mama moves lightning-quick. She grabs the gem just before it hits the concrete. She's panting heavily; you can see her chest heaving in a sports bra that she was probably wearing just before going to bed.  
  
You stare at the gem in her hand. And then you shake your head and reach for it. "M-my soul, p-please."  
  
Your mama pants again. Finally, she brings it back to your hand. You stare at the thing; it's bright purple, almost pink. You didn't think your soul was going to be _that_ pink, but honestly you kind of like that shade. It's nice. You flip it over; the thing glimmers with brilliant power, a bright white light in a golden cage with a little bit of gathering black swirling inside.  
  
It's nothing huge. But your hand's shaking.  
  
"Shit." You turn to where Kyubey was and...  
  
It's gone.  
  
As though it wasn't even there.  
  
Your moms stare at you, then at the gem. Your mom hasn't moved from the spot where she landed. She's still got her hands on her mouth. Your mama isn't in much better shape; she's staring at the gem with eyes still wet with tears.  
  
"Fuck, Mina," your mama mutters. "Fuck."  
  
You're still panting. You realize that the nightmare you saw was their emotional state. It happened in the blink of an eye. A swirling nightmare of destruction and death. It's not clear yet. Nothing's clear yet. You wished to understand their everything, but perhaps you're not really there yet.  
  
Does Kyubey come with a warranty?  
  
"Yeah."  
  
Your mom keeps staring, her hands finally falling to her sides. "Minako, you..."  
  
"I know what I'm getting into," you say. "I know exactly what I'm getting into, mom, and I am _fine._ I'm going to be fucking fine."  
  
Your mom starts to hyperventilate right in front of you and god you can feel it. Your new powers twitch and you can _feel_ it. You can feel that infinite ocean before it turns into a roiling _tempest._ A tempest that twists and warps into a looming _vortex_ as her thoughts spiral out of control. Self-loathing, self-defeat, unresolved fears and terrors from decades of pain. Her hair stands on end as you feel the pain echo through her head and back into yours.  
  
All in less than a second.  
  
You stumble backwards. That was another fuckup in a long, long line of fuckups that you're making tonight. You clutch the side of your head, then stumble back into a brick wall.  
  
You didn't think you hit it hard enough to crack brick, but you hear the clay shatter under the force. _"Shit!"_ Finally, you press your hand against the wall and keep yourself upright. "Fucking _shit."_  
  
Your mom finally knocks herself out of her stupor. She clutches your shoulder. "We'll go home, okay?" she says. "We s-should go home."  
  
"Right, yeah." You press your hand to your temple. You hate this fucking power. That was such a stupid wish; what the _hell_ were you thinking? You keep close to your mom, and your mama's just a few meters behind, eyes darting around for Kyubey (you got the feeling it's short for something in your brief dive into your parents' emotional strata).  
  
That thing is fucking evil. You knew it was evil. Of _course_ it's evil. Regret's creeping in on you and you wish your parents came a minute earlier. But maybe things just worked out that way. Maybe you're unlucky. Maybe it's God. If She exists then She's a _prick._  
  
You almost stomp up the steps, but the second you do, one of them _cracks_ under your feet. Your mom immediately presses her hand into your shoulder, finally a little calmer after a few minutes of walking. Her eyes are still swollen. Another flash and she's in pain. But she keeps herself steady as she speaks.  
  
"Take a deep breath," she says. "It's hard to get used to. Everything will feel like cardboard."  
  
"Right." You shake your head. "I'm just..." You slip a little and grab a railing. Your hand grips it tight enough to dent the metal in the shape of your clenched fist.  
  
Behind you, your mama lifts you from under your arms. A read, and you think she'd be laughing if she wasn't just...numb.  
  
Her state was flaming red while you were walking home, but the vision you got was that of a featureless void. An ice rink with flames licking the underside. Boiling hot, but with a thin cover to keep it from eating the world.  
  
Her mind is a crucifix, embedded in the ice. At the top, a single burning candle.  
  
It's been surprisingly easy to get some kind of handle on this as you focus yourself. You get clearer images, a better idea of who the people around you are.  
  
But you also feel them _perfectly._ And god it's so much.  
  
You're knocked out of this read again. You breathe in, then out. In, then out. And you wipe the tears from your face.  
  
You rub your eyes and face and nose and mouth and you take a deep, deep breath. "Fuck."  
  
You all reach the apartment. Your mom walks inside, and she takes a look at you. A long, painful stare at you. She's stopped crying for now, but her eyes are still swollen and her cheeks are still glistening. She turns back to the bedroom and quietly moves in.  
  
Your mama, however, stops. "So what did you wish for?"  
  
"I...uh...?"  
  
"What did you wish for? If you don't want to tell me, that's fine." It's not. You don't need to read her to tell that much. "But I just..." A crack. She shakes her head.

"I wanted to understand," you say. "That's it. I wanted to get you and mom and my girlfriend and stuff. So I wished for that and I'm uh..." You breathe in through your nose. "Not great."  
  
"Is it bad?" your mama asks. "If...okay." She's processing.  
  
Another flash and this time you see a hanging noose made of prayer beads and a cross, just over a pool of blood and the silhouettes of two people: a mother and a child.  
  
That was a mistake. You reel backwards before clutching the sides of your head. You knew mom was thinking about that but you weren't expecting _that._ You weren't expecting to see that at _all._  
  
"I hate this fucking power I hate this fucking _power."_  
  
Your mama keeps silent as she clutches your shoulders.  
  
"Shhh..." She takes a breath. "So you're an empath."  
  
You stare ahead and of _course_ they'd know how to classify your power. You nod weakly. "Y-yeah."  
  
Your mama rubs your back and keeps her chin on your shoulder. She squeezes you tight, careful not to squeeze too hard, but you're not that careful. You clutch back as tight as you can. She doesn't flinch.  
  
God, she really is superhuman.  
  
"You chose the most difficult power you could have possibly gotten." Your mama keeps a hold on you. "Shit, Mina."  
  
"Right. Right, I did. Of course I did." You squeeze your eyes shut and keep a tight hold on your mama. "I just...I should probably go to bed."  
  
"Yeah. We...should." Your mama finally lets go, but before she lets you back to your room, she pulls out an oddly shaped gem. "Hey, here."  
  
You take it quickly. It looks like a miniature Mitakihara monument...which means... "Grief seed?"  
  
"Your girlfriend told you about that, too?"  
  
"She used the Monument to heal up her gem, yeah," you say.  
  
"...is that how you knew about soul gems, too?"  
  
"She told me," you say. "I just...I knew about that, yeah."  
  
"Hm." Your mama doesn't say anything. Finally, she does walk back to her room and the door shuts behind her. You decide to just go to bed. You lay on your side, wide awake, staring at a wall. You're waiting for the moment when you can undo how badly you fucked up.  
  
You don't fall asleep for an hour.  
  


[=]

Your name is Kyouko Sakura. Your door shuts behind you, and on your bed is your wife. Your beautiful wife. Her eyes are still wet. She's staring at her hands, quietly sobbing every few seconds. The moonlight floods in from just outside, bathing the room in a bright blue glow.  
  
You keep your eyes on your wife. Your own cheeks are a little wet, but you stopped it before it got too bad. Minako didn't need both their moms to be a wreck. They didn't need that.  
  
But now they're in bed.  
  
And you can't do this anymore.  
  
You collapse to your knees and bury your face in your hands. It takes all of your willpower not to scream out. Your nose is running and your eyes are streaming and you're just sobbing into your hands and you bury your own crying by biting down on your tongue hard enough to draw blood.  
  
The room is dead silent save for the sound of you sobbing into your hands. It's ugly. You haven't had a cry like this in a long time. Your hands are a fucking mess and so are you. You clutch the sides of your head, breathing haggard as you try to keep it from getting too loud.  
  
It's not working.  
  
Your wife is finally moving off the bed. She slumps off the side, feet dragging across carpet as she reaches you. She pushes her hands into your shoulders and leans her forehead against yours.  
  
"W-we fuckin' failed. We fucking failed as parents. We're just fucking failures and we thought we could-"  
  
You're choking on your own words now. You're borderline incoherent. You hate feeling like this. You hate everything here. You hate how you have to handle your child making the same goddamn mistake that you did. You hate that you can't blame anything except for that _invincible rat fucker._  
  
Your wife presses her forehead against yours. She's not saying anything back. And honestly, you don't want to hear any words of encouragement or reassurance. They feel so fucking hollow and you want to puke.  
  
Your wife rubs your shoulder. She runs her hand down your arm before using her left to try and wipe her eyes. She pulls her gem out.  
  
It's halfway. You do the same. You're there too.  
  
You didn't even notice the time. You pull out your phone and it's been twenty minutes. You didn't even notice it happen.  
  
"Shit." Sayaka mutters. "I-" she sniffs "-I have work."  
  
"Yeah." You rub your eyes. You should probably get up and get a tissue. But that would mean getting away from your wife. "I...I don't. Training's off until Thursday. I...ugh. I think I know how I-" a sob, but you try to turn it into a laugh, "-I'm spending the next few days."  
  
She tries to laugh but it sounds even worse than yours. "I-I guess so." She shakes her head.  
  
"Our child is an empath," you say.  
  
Sayaka squeezes her eyes shut. "Of course they are." She sniffs. "Of _course_ they are."  
  
"They wanted to understand us. Just get us." You bite your lip. Your fang feels weirdly sharp today. "Maybe keeping the uh...keeping it from them was a bad idea."  
  
Sayaka doesn't say anything. She curls up just underneath you before leaning against your stomach. You stroke her hair.  
  
Finally, you curl up with her and fall asleep on the floor. You're both going to be sore in the morning.  
  
You don't care. You can deal with it. Your wife can too.  
  
But it'll take so much work.  
  


[=]

It's morning. You wake up and make breakfast, but the morning is dead silent. You and Sayaka were _fucking sore_ after waking up, and it took a bit of a shower to feel less gross afterwards. Minako, meanwhile, is equally quiet. They're poking awkwardly at their plate, and when they finally do eat, they don't finish their food.  
  
You take a deep breath.  
  
Sayaka gives you a brief kiss. She can't even look Mina in the eye as she runs out the door to work.  
  
Minako winces. They know _exactly_ how Sayaka felt. You get the feeling that they reached out to her emotions and felt what you saw.  
  
You should probably make a decision on what to do. You don't know if Minako is in a state to go to school.

"Hey," you ask your kid. "Wanna ditch school?"  
  
Minako leans on their hand. They rub their temple and push their eggs around. They take a deep, deep breath. "Fuck it, sure."  
  
"Aight. I know a place."  
  
"Is it the training-"  
  
"No, actually. It's a place that Sayaka thinks was torn down. Up by the hills at the east end of town. Just an old abandoned theme park."  
  
They pierce the top of the yolk. It spills out across the plate, reaching into the rice and sausage before they finally just stab at it.  
  
"Just kinda wanted to train ya, you know. Just..." You rub your eyes to stop yourself. You're okay right now. You oughta stay that way. "Get you the basics. Your moms are two of the best magi in the country, y'know."  
  
They give you a nod. "Right, yeah." They probably have no idea how right that is, and honestly you hate the fact that it's a completely accurate statement. You and Sayaka are exceptionally skilled, yes. It's the only reason you two have lasted as long as you have.  
  
You send a message out, then. _'Hey, to the magi in the area, we got a new one. My kid just contracted last night. If you want to help me train that'd be fuckin' great.'_  
  
A second. Then two. Then three. Then, finally, you get a voice back and-  
  
_'I'll be there.'_  
  
It's Takane. And she sounds...not great. Probably because she was trying just as hard as you and Sayaka to keep this from Mina.  
  
_'It's a different place from normal. Just over the hills and around the swamplands. The Ferris wheel collapsed so it's a bit hard to find, but I can help you out.'  
  
'Mmm. Right.'_  
  
You stand up. "Okay, so first lesson will be after you eat breakfast."  
  
They finally do finish their meal, and when they do, you take them down to the sidewalk in front of the apartment complex. It's a bit crowded today, but you also know that Kyubey will simply wipe most of these peoples' memories, so honestly, it's fine.  
  
That, and you honestly hope it fucks up its plans. Even in a _small_ way. You're feeling real fucking petty.  
  
You tighten your belt, ruffle your jacket (a G.L.O.S.S. jacket this time), and take a step outside in the autumn breeze. Sun's starting to rise, and the shadows are stretching faaaaaaaaaaar across the ground. The apartment you're in faces northward, so you and Minako turn right towards the hills. The normal training place can be seen from here, a tiny grey dot on a sea of beige grass, but that's not where you're going right now.  
  
"So magi are superhuman. Straight up fuckin' superhuman. You will never need a car as long as you live. Maybe you might need public transportation, but otherwise? Cars are for chumps." You tap your feet against the ground. "Now, be careful. It takes a bit of practice to Jump without breaking the ground."  
  
Minako shakes their head. "Wait, jump?"  
  
"Yeah, Jump."  
  
You bend your knees, and you do...well, that. Without much effort, you _jump_ about six meters upwards. The concrete under your feet shudders and the force kicks up a bit of stray dust, shoved out from underneath and up between the cracks. You hit the ground with a light _tap,_ your hands in your pocket, your undercut swaying in the breeze.  
  
"Like so."  
  
Minako blinks in surprise before quickly looking down at their own feet. They pull their hands out of their hoodie pockets, bend their knees a _bit_ too far, and jump.  
  
They soar straight upwards, into a lamppost and _through_ it, hard enough to pull it out of the ground and cause it to collapse into someone's balcony. A person walking just nearby screams in surprise as Minako goes up, _up, **up.**_  
  
Finally, gravity takes hold. They start to descend at high speed, and immediately you move forwards towards the rest of a surprised crowd. "Hup! Stand back! Kid's falling!"  
  
You pull your arms out and Minako _slams_ into your hands. Momentum carries you both downwards, hard into the ground, but you keep your knee to the ground for balance. The concrete underneath shatters with a loud _**CRASH,**_ and honestly you don't feel that rough.  
  
But you've also been working out nonstop for almost two decades.  
  
Minako...has not.  
  
_"Owwwww..."_ they grumble as they pull themself out of your arms. "Owwhohowww."  
  
"Yeah, you're almost as reedy as I was at fourteen." You say. "But hey, on the plus side you have a hell of a jump." You tap your feet against the ground. "Well, you can definitely jump. We can work on that later. But can you run?"  
  
"Yeah." Minako shakes their head.  
  
"Not just _run._ I mean can you run like a _magi?"_  
  
Minako squints. "Like, Hulk-jump everywhere?"  
  
"Basically." You tap your feet and take a few bounding steps backwards. "Just follow me!" And then you bend your knees and go _flying._ Your feet bound across the concrete wall of a different apartment building, up by a clothesline and through a mess of wires. You then take that opportunity to stop at the power lines, two feet on the electrical lines and your arms crossed. You're adept at keeping your balance; Lord knows you had to with _fullplate,_ but you're more interested in seeing if Minako can handle this part.  
  
And lo, they can.  
  
Their leaps are clumsy, their moves destructive. They feet hit the same wall you did, but their final leap cracks concrete and causes chunks to fall to the ground. They rip a piece of clothing from the line, bump into a brick wall, but then finally reach the power line you're on. Their movement shakes the entire thing, almost disrupting your stance but _nooot_ quite.  
  
You squat down as they hang just underneath, one hand on the lines, the other dangling by their side.  
  
"Not bad!" you say. "Yeah, you're taking to it pretty well. But let's continue the lesson; follow me."  
  
You let yourself fall down backwards, knees still bent in a squat, before you stretch them right out. Minako shakes helplessly underneath, their hand flailing wildly before they clench their fist and _swing._ They go down, down, _down,_ right into another apartment complex. Their feet hit an air conditioning unit before they take a leap forwards. The poor thing is knocked out of its hinges, but they're definitely getting a better handle on movement.  
  
You nod. They're taking to magi movement pretty well.  
  
A bit too well, honestly.  
  
But you're not about to say that out loud. And neither would Sayaka.


	2. Wham!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minako and their mom train.

It takes a few minutes, but you and Minako bound over the top of the hill, past the training zone and into a forest just outside of town. The place is utterly deserted, devoid of evidence of human life, save for the odd ruined house.  
  
And, well, your training zone. You and Minako reach a clearing, feet patting red clay and sending bits of dirt into the air.  
  
It's one of the few dry spots in the bog, where a company that's long since gone bankrupt thought they could establish a park. Just close enough to Mitakihara for business, just far enough out of the way to be exotic. But the bog proved a true adversary. Part of the biggest attraction, a massive wooden roller coaster, had collapsed midway into its first year, killing everyone riding it and taking out a number of pedestrians that were unlucky enough to be too close.  
  
Since then, it's been abandoned. The company never recovered, and now you have a rad training ground.  
  
The roller coaster has long since rotted into the dirt, reduced to scaffolding that is barely visible among the trees. The Ferris wheel is on her side, the carousel still shimmering under trees that had overgrown it, bumper cars have fists and sword slashes marked in them, and...  
  
Well, there's a tree that you hadn't seen in a while. A tree with you and Sayaka's names carved into it, with a heart and the words "Love Me Do" scratched in underneath.  
  
You smile.  
  
But you have a kid to train. "Okay, so." You crack your knuckles. "Mind transforming?"  
  
Magi don't need to be taught to transform. That's a quirk of the whole thing. Your soul just _knows_ how to transform, how to form a weapon, how to make the uniform. You wonder if that's just how souls work, if that's just a bit of the power used to counter entropy at work.  
  
"Uh...right, yes." They press their hands together. They look at you and wince.  
  
You blink a bit, then realize they were probably reading your emotions again. Including the ones you were trying to keep buried.  
  
"Focus on transforming, alright?" You lean down. "We can try learning how to control your power later. But right now, we got the basics."  
  
"I...yes."  
  
They breathe in through their nose and clap their hands together. And the first thing that forms is a hood over their head and a mask over their face. The top of their mask shimmers with _gold,_ their arms growing leather straps and shimmering golden guards. The hood spreads down their chest into a wide-open hoodie as several strips of cloth flow out from the sides. Their skirt transforms into a pair of shorts and their shirt splits into a series of scarves that wrap around their torso. Knee guards explode into existence over their bare legs and their shoes grow into boots.  
  
At the center of their chest, an inverted purple triangle shimmers into existence and the scarf grows three eyes, one of them wide-open, the other two closed shut. And, well, finally comes their weapon. A long bar of metal extends from their hand, the tip of it scraping against dried clay, before the head balloons into a fat edge.  
  
And it takes you a second to realize your child has a goddamn baseball bat. They circle it over their head as the ground shimmers into purple sparks and the path that they carry it over gleams with a brilliant mandala.

****

  
Definitely not quite what you were expecting. And if you didn't know how shit being a magi was, you'd be proud that your kid looks as rad as they do.  
  
Shit even with that, you're still proud. It's hard to keep that feeling down.  
  
They strike a pose with the bat, then they blink. Then they grin. The mask on their face matches the expression underneath.  
  
"So, how's it look?" they ask. The mouth that's drawn on their mask matches their lip movements one-to-one, an ornate, shifting white pattern overtop a black ski mask.  
  
"You know what I feel about it. But I gotta say, you look like a badass. I hope you know that."

Your kid beams. And you remember why you love being a mom. 

  
Minako tries their hardest not to have the smile explode off of their face and through the mask, which has itself almost completely turned into a gigantic shit-eating grin.  
  
You smirk and crack your knuckles. "Okay, so, first thing's first."  
  
You look through a booth for something vaguely toy-like, and sure enough you find something worth throwing. A heavily-decayed furby or five, a horrific monkey with cymbals that's miraculously not been touched by nature (presumably because they were terrified of the damn thing) and a million bowling pins, rubber balls, and a whole assortment of awful looking molded plastic.  
  
You know that Mina would have zero problem batting these out of the air.  
  
"Okay, so..." You peek your head out from behind the booth.  
  
Mina's just watching you intently, eyes narrowed behind their hood.  
  
_"Think fast!"  
_  
You throw a rubber ball right at their face. It smacks them in the nose and they immediately yelp in surprise.  
  
"Mama, what the _fu-"  
_  
You throw a furby next. It makes a vaguely demonic voice; a twisted, gutteral cry of how much it _"Loooooooooves youuuuuuuuuuuuu"_ before you toss it with enough force the knock one of the eyes out. It flies towards Minako's face, but this time they're ready. They bat the furby out of the air, hard enough to cause it to detonate in an explosion of parts and fur and battery acid.  
  
Next you throw a bowling pin. Once again, they smack it out of the air. Next a rubber ball. It bursts. Next another furby, this time missing a head. It explodes again, this time causing a shotgun blast of plastic to pepper the ground and break the booth you're standing behind. A rubber ball turns into a missile. A rusted bell from a High striker shatter. A plastic toy truck is blown to pieces.  
  
"Good, _good!"_ You grin. "Now, try to block those _without breaking them."_  
  
"Wait, _what?"_  
  
You throw a furby's head. They bat it aside, but this one breaks into pieces. They swear.  
  
A rubber ball. They try to swat it aside but it's not hard enough. This one smacks them in the face.  
  
_"Ow!"_  
  
A plastic truck. This time, they swat it lightly, and the truck tumbles into the ground behind them.  
  
"Ha! I fucking did-!"  
  
This time another truck smacks them in the face and it _breaks_ on impact. The pieces rain down in a shower of wheels and plastic pieces and they're just staring right at you.  
  
"Good job blocking that truck but you _gotta_ make that consistent."  
  
You throw another bowling pin, which breaks into pieces.  
  
They hiss in frustration, "Oh, for fuck's _sake!"_ before another rubber ball hits them in the face.  
  
"You're doing great, sweetie!"  
  
_"Fuck you!"_  
  
It takes all your willpower not to laugh. They really are doing their best. So then you decide to pull out all the stops.  
  
"Okay, now, just _block all of these!"_ You begin to just throw everything that you can grab. A rubber ball. Yet _another_ fucking furby. The pieces of a plush toy. Plastic cars. A Star Wars action figure. Is that a Neil Breen toy? A bootleg game console.  
  
Smacked in the face. Explodes to pieces. Blown to fluff. First car gets hit, but the other two hit the ground behind them. Han Solo dies. Neil Breen gets Doubled Down. And the Not-NES smacks Mina hard enough in the face to knock them flat on their back.  
  
Minako stares at the sky overhead, eyes half-lidded, expression on their mask completely flat. You move forward. "Not bad for a first time."  
  
They stare at you. They blink twice, then they look even _more_ annoyed. "You're having too much fun, mama."  
  
"Damn right." You raise your hand up.  
  
They grab it and pull themself up. They dust themself off. They grunt at the dust on their body.  
  
"Oh, you can just transform twice and that cleans your uniform."  
  
"Aha." They flash purple, and immediately they're back in their mask and hood. "Neat! Does it work on-"  
  
"It works on normal clothes, too."  
  
They click their tongue. "Nice."  
  
Good to know they're taking well to being a magi...distressingly well. You honestly probably should have expected it. They are _your_ child after all. You take a breath. "Right."  
  
They wince. They probably felt that out of you.  
  
"Sorry," you say. "You probably felt that."  
  
Minako inhales. Their mask grimaces, and they put their hand on the back of their head. "I just...yeah, I did. It was...deep red. Blood red."  
  
The first eye on their scarf shirt is wide-open, and in a flash it turns bright red. It stares at you, eye tracing over your body and, more importantly, right towards the ring on your hand.  
  
"That eye represents where your power's going?"  
  
They look utterly baffled, then their eyes widen. They look down at their chest and notice the eye staring at you. They twist their body and it's still staring right at you. "I guess it does." They nod. "Huh. Neat."  
  
You hear the trees behind you crack, and both you and Mina turn to see Takane crash down. She's still in her school uniform, pretty obviously skipping school just like how you told Minako to. She dusts herself off and waves towards you. "Ms. Miki-Sakura?"  
  
"Hey." You wave at her.  
  
Then she notices Minako. The eye on Minako's body turns green, and it turns its gaze right towards Takane. Minako averts their gaze almost immediately.  
  
Takane takes a step backwards. "...you're an empath."  
  
"Yes. I know it's a shit power." Minako rubs the back of their neck. "I've been...not great since last night."  
  
There's an awkward silence. A long, painful silence. Takane just stares at her partner. Minako kicks at the ground with a boot and tries to pay attention to basically anything else.  
  
You're going to nip this in the bud. "Okay, _so!"_ You clap your hands. "What're we doing. Do you want to spar or..."  
  
"Spar?" Minako blinks. "Like...like what mom did with Takane?"  
  
"Oh, they'd been sparring with me plenty of times." Takane says. "First person I fought with was Akane."  
  
Minako pauses. Then the eye turns a bright green again. Their eyes widen before they choke a little. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised that she's apparently fierce, but-"  
  
"She is terrifying, yes." Takane claps their hands. "What about you, Ms. Miki-Sakura? What do you suggest?"  
  
You grimace. "Well, honestly, you probably should spar if you're here. Just to get a feel for combat. Though the rules are just to first hit for either of you." You look at the two of them. "First hit on torso _._ If it's a serious impact, then the fight's over."  
  
"Right." Minako nods and raises their bat over their shoulder.  
  
Takane claps her hands, and flicks her arms out to the sides. Her gauntlets form first, gloves flexing as each individual shell loads itself onto a cartridge that rapidly materializes, after which a series of tiny vines burst out from the base and wrap around her arms. It wraps around her upper body, lining her chest and finally growing into a skirt and a three-pronged coat.  
  
Her boots burst into existence on the ground and her hat blossoms out of a flower that grows onto her head as a series of leaves unfold onto her back before tying themselves into a shouldercape.  
  
Finally comes her ammo belt, which wraps across her stomach and clicks itself into place. She raises her arms, right hand in front, left behind.  
  


  
"Don't get easy on them," you say. "Don't obliterate them, but don't-"  
  
["I won't."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuuWilfOMLo) Takane takes a deep breath and stares Minako down. Her stance grows wider, deeper and further.  
  
Meanwhile, Minako matches with their own wide stance. "Okay, so...who-"  
  
Before they can finish, a blur of green appears right in front of their face, from twenty meters to _three_ in just a couple of seconds.  
  
They only have a split-second to react, and they start by batting down Takane's arm and twisting their torso to the side. The shotgun blasts the ground behind them before they grab the bat by the fat end and try to elbow Takane in the face.  
  
Takane pushes the arm up, just over her head, before she twists her torso and sends your child towards the ground with a brutal arm twist. Mina spins at a million miles an hour, their bat wrenched out of their hand as Takane huffs.  
  
"Concussive!" They level both their arms to Minako's stomach and _fire._  
  
The shot is hard enough to cause them to cry out in pain, sending them tumbling across the ground. They bounce across the dirt, through a bunch of grass and right through the wall of a Tunnel O' Love.  
  
And you know it's a Tunnel O' Love because you can hear the _splash_ as they're thrown in awful swamp water.  
  
_"Owwwwwww-"_  
  
"Ohmigosh I'm sorry!" Takane shouts. "I thought you were going to block that!"  
  
"N-no it's okay!" Minako's voice echoes from inside a paddle boat. "It's _totally cool!_ M-my guts just feel like _jelly_ it's _fine!"_

Yeah, this is about what you expected for a first sparring session.

You clamber over to the hole in the Tunnel O' Love to see Minako transforming and de-transforming. They shake their hands as though they're still covered in filth.  
  
"Fucking _A."_ They shake their head.  
  
Takane glances between both you and Minako, as though she's expecting you to chastise your child for bad language.  
  
"Yeah, you took that punch _hard._ Good thing she went for a concussive shot." You walk over. "You okay?"  
  
_"No!"_ They stumble out of the hole. "O-h-h-howwowoww!" They spit on the ground before slowly drifting their hand away from their stomach. "Okay, I could have sworn that hurt way more a second ago."  
  
"Yeah, that's another quirk." You raise your hand towards your kid and pull them through the hole. "You can ignore most injuries just fine; magi bodies can heal from most minor wounds without effort."  
  
Takane walks over. "Are you okay, Mina?"  
  
"I'm good!" They stumble out. The eye on their chest turns bright green. They blink, then whip their head towards Takane. The mouth on their mask turns shocked before it broadens into another gigantic smile.  
  
Takane blushes back, then she relaxes and moves forward. "I'm just glad you weren't hurt too badly."  
  
"I know." Minako pulls their mask down and sticks their lips out, and Takane quickly pecks them right back.  
  
You nod. "Alright, so another spar, preferably with less concussive blasts." You look them both over. "Okay so, Takane, mind giving a rundown of Minako's magi progress?"  
  
"O-oh! Right." Takane clears her throat. "You didn't last very long. I rushed in, you blocked, but that left you open. I twisted your arms and you didn't have a counter for the cross-up, and you didn't even manage to let go of the bat before I shot you in the stomach." She scratches her cheek. "You basically, uh...you did everything wrong."  
  
Minako sighs. "Okay, shit."  
  
"N-no! It's not that bad! You still had fast enough reflexes to block my initial attack! But being a magi is a bit more than reflexes."  
  
You lean over. "It's planning. Anyone can be the fastest magi. Anyone can hit real hard. Anyone can beat the shit out of you. But what it comes down to is knowing your toolset, knowing your opponent's toolset, and countering the fuck outta them. Like, you've uh..." you twist your hands around "...you've played Samurai Shodown 7, right?"  
  
"Oh? Ooooh!" Minako claps their hands. "So like how a fighting game has characters and how tournaments are set up with people who know all the characters?"  
  
"Yeah! Like that!" You nod. "But the thing is that fighting other magi, and even other witches, is a buncha unknowns. And it's impossible to plan for all of them. What you _can_ do is make a good guess." You glance to Takane. "Or be like your girlfriend."  
  
Takane nods. She presses her hand to her chest. "I'm a planner. My wish was to 'Help my friend plan ahead'."  
  
Minako's chest flashes green. They wince, their eyes go shut, and they take a deep breath.  
  
Takane pauses. She bites her lip, then shakes her head and moves on. "My entire skillset is based around getting a feel for a person's skillset and abilities, then planning around those. My powers give me a large amount of versatility in a fight and allow me to fill different roles depending on my loadout."  
  
You nod. "Now, not every magi is like Takane. Your mom is way more specialized around healing and tanking. I'm about hitting _hard._ Akane is about locking down a zone and turning certain parts of the battlefield into death zones. The fighting game analogy isn't _perfect,_ 'cause, I mean, we aren't locked down by some fucking moves list, but it's a good way of thinking of being a magi."  
  
Minako nods. "Hrm...I mean, makes kinda sense. So what do you think I am?"  
  
"Dunno," you say. "But I think we oughta spar a little more. Maybe once or twice more?"  
  
Minako winces. "I...right. Okay."  
  
"Look, we can go for ice cream right afterwards. My treat."  
  
Minako shrugs. "I...hm."  
  
Takane clutches their shoulders. "Look at this way. This is to help you learn a little. I won't hit you as hard this time, and I'll make sure not to injure you. Okay?" She kisses their cheek. "I'll be careful, Mina."  
  
Minako clutches Takane's hand, then grabs her cheek and pulls her lips to their mask, which now looks like a pair of kissing lips.  
  
"Then you owe me a date." Mina smiles before jumping back and forming a brand-new bat.  
  
Takane flexes her arms and reloads her gauntlets. "We were already going to date tonight, silly!"  
  
You take a few quick steps backwards. Minako still has a long way to go. But hey, they still have you and Sayaka to help them out.  
  
Speaking of, you wonder how your wife is doing.  
  


[[=]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnZA52oTp6M)

  
Your name is Sayaka, and you're currently in the industrial district at the edge of town. More specifically, you're in an empty part of one of the refineries; the place is closed off because of a ruined walkway (you think this is where Kyouko fought Uriko a few days ago), and because of that, this particular smokestack was shut off. Nobody could maintain it or inspect it, and Mitakihara laws dictate that a lack of inspection or supervision means that part of the refinery must be shut down.

That makes it a perfect scouting spot.

Work let you go out early, especially after your Chief Inspector noticed that you're not doing particularly great. And given that you hadn't missed work or a patrol until this point, she gave you the week off. Like, the entire week.

So now you're sitting in a longcoat. The weather suddenly got colder after last night, from 20-degree weather to 15. It was sudden and you're definitely chilly now.

Your wife told you that she was taking your kid to train. She didn't say where. You wonder if that old park is still around. You thought that place was torn down. Apparently not.

But that's a side note. What's important is that you can get a report on the goings-on across the bay. Which is why you're overlooking the bridge between Kasamino and Mitakihara, leaning against a smokestack with a click of your tongue and a foot against the railing.

You don't normally do what Kyouko does. But you don't feel great. And you're fighting down the urge to bite your tongue off and rip the railing off of the walkway and smash the smokestack with how much of a fucking failure you are.

You breathe in through your nose. You breathe in deep, _deep_ through your nose. Minako could probably feel that if you were close to them.

Suddenly, you see four dots jumping from the bridge. They leap over the wires, slide across the railing, and jump over the lampposts. Erika, Suzu, Ume, and Takara land on the railing next to you, then all pull out their phones. They're all wearing nondescript jeans and turtlenecks, each color-coded to match their magi outfits.

You whip out your own phone and tap it against theirs

"This everything?" you ask. The data transfer takes less than a second per phone.

"Everything we could write down." Erika sighs. "They're definitely planning something. But what that is, we don't know what. None of us got spotted yet, and I didn't even need to transform while I was over there." She pulls her platinum blond hair behind her ear. "Suzu didn't sense anything, Ume was able to get a good look at stuff, Takara didn't even need to pull the panic button."

"It was clean," Takara says. "Shockingly clean. Can't believe it."

"Mm." Suzu nods. "It...nothing. I got nothing while over there. Didn't even have threats."

"I'm not sure if they're incompetent or arrogant or both." Ume scratches the back of her head. "But I don't know if it'll stay that way, either."

"So, what did you get? Just give me a quick rundown."

"Okay, so!" Erika raises her phone to your face, her own screen on the back side. "I managed to get a few photographs from where my senses warned me about. One of the girls is 'Yuri;' said she was experimenting with the upper limits of her timeline-manipulation abilities."

"Do you mean time travel, or...?"

"It doesn't seem like time travel, no. When they discussed it, they said they were talking about 'names.' Namely, how to find targets. I didn't know if it meant scouting the timeline or predicting the future."

"Time travel's just a dangerous power in general. If they fuck with the timeline-"

"That's not a problem," Erika says before nodding to Ume.

Ume continues. "Timelines don't get altered. They split. What happens instead of a timeline rewrite or some butterfly effect nonsense is a timeline split. Different realities split off from a diverging point."

You frown. You wonder how many alternative paths Homura left in her wake. You shake your head. "But did you get anything else?"

"Well, it seems like it was successful. When I scouted the meeting room, though, they were already in the process of erasing whatever 'it' was." Ume scratches the back of her head. "But they're organized. Organized enough to rent out meeting rooms."

"Any reason they wouldn't have closed the blinds?" you ask.

"Supposedly because they weren't expecting anyone to actually know what they were talking about." Suzu shrugs. "That or it's a trap."

"Wouldn't you have sensed it if it were a trap?"

"Yeah I would've. Unless they have some kind of masking power." She turns to Takara.

Takara nods and turns to you. "No jamming. They did attempt to look for intruders. Didn't sense us. Didn't find us either. Probably arrogant."

"I think we could continue to find out more if we're allowed another search." Erika says. "We found enough to interest you and there's more on those files that we gave you. But even then, I suspect there's more going on there. And you're right; timeline manipulation has the potential for danger and it's setting alarm bells off for me."

You glance to Ume. "Can you get Yuki here? I think he might be a good fit."

She nods. "Yeah, he should be."

Yuki's relatively new; hot pink hair, in his early twenties, and he just started his college program in Mitakihara. He's taller than you by a head, toned and muscular. Not quite to Akane's levels, but you'd guess that he's at least as strong as you are. And you know that part of the reason he moved to town was also because Mitakihara is more than willing to pay for hormone therapy.

His powers are centered around time reversal, about comparable to an undo button. Part of why he's lasted as long as he has is because of his ability to just bring himself an hour back in time.

Well, that and he also possesses the ability to read possibilities based on his previous failed attempt. He can see how the rest of the timeline would have progressed before he resets, usually an hour ahead. This gives him an idea of how parallel universes can set up; he can see the different possibilities almost immediately.

You raise your hand and send him a quick message.

_'Hey, you busy tomorrow?'_ You look south and to the west. Mitakihara U is on the bay, sporting a floating aquatics lab, a landlocked physics lab, and some of the best research facilities in the country. _'We have a situation brewing in Kasamino.'_

_'Ah, shit.'_ He pauses. There's a few seconds, and you presume he's trying to stop doing a particularly dangerous experiment. Whatever it is. _'Okay, so what do you mean?'_

_'I mean someone is trying to mess with timelines.'_

_'...wait, what?'_

_'What do you know about multiverse-'_

_'Yes, yes, multiverse theory-'_ He pauses, _'Yeah, multiverse theory still works as a name. But yes, I'm guessing a magi is messing with timelines? You know that they can't mess with the past, cor-'_

_'I know that much, yeah.'_ You lean your back against the concrete smoke stack. _'But I also know that sometimes they can fuck around with other timelines or see into the future. And either of those are problems.'_

_'Do you think I'm an expert?'_

_'I think you're close enough that you're a good fit.'_

He's quiet for a long, long while. Then he sighs. _'Yeah, sure. When do you want us to head over the bridge?'_

_'What time's good with you?'_

_'I have class today. I can head out tomorrow and be back with a report the next day.'_

You nod and push yourself off the pillar. _'That works. Thanks Yuki.'_

_'Yeah. You owe me, Sayaka.'_

_'Grocery shopping?'_

_'Yep. Also a favor.'_

You sigh. _'Fine. It's a deal.'_

_'Right-o. Meet at the bridge at 5pm?'_

_'Yep.'_

_'Solid.'_

And with that, you cut the connection. You glance over everyone. "So, who wants to sit the next-"

Erika raises her hand. "I'm pretty replaceable. Takara is a perfect getaway magi, Ume can still scout areas out, and Suzu is a danger sensor. I can scout clearly, but that doesn't mean that I'm particularly useful when I can't understand the information at hand." She puts her arms behind her head. "I mean, it's dense and I'm not exactly an expert."

You nod. "Right, makes sense." You turn around. "Reconvene tomorrow at 6:00 pm sharp."

And with that, the others split. You climb to the top of the railing, balanced perfectly on top of a thin piece of metal that probably wasn't supposed to carry this much weight. You glance to the hills. _'How's training?'_

_'Almost done,'_ Kyouko answers. _'I had Mina spar their girlfriend a couple more times.'_

_'Did they win?'_

Another pregnant pause. _'Uh, no. No they did not.'_

_'Not surprising.'_

_'Well, we still don't know their skillset and what they're capable of. Just their empathy powers. Wait, hold on...'_

Another pause. Then a new voice reaches you.

_'Uh, uhhh...hi, mom?'_

You swallow. Yeah, that's your kid. _'Hey, Mina. Can you sense me this far?'_

_'I don't think so? I only sense mama and Takane right now. My power probably has an active radius.'_

_'Right, neat.'_ You keep on looking out to the mountains. Talking to Minako after...last night is somehow less stressful than seeing them with their soul gem. But, well, you can cry about it in your wife's arms later. You swallow hard. _'What's your weapon?'_

_'A bat? It looks kind of like a Kanabo.'_

_'Trust me, our kid looks fucking awesome.'_ You can _feel_ Kyouko's smirk on the other side. You're glad that _she_ feels proud of your kid. You kind of do too, but you find it hard to muster up the energy for hype. You tap your foot against the railing.  
_  
'Well, I'm off from work and I checked in with the Kasamino group. Should we meet up for lunch?'_

_'Yeah.'_ You pace across the railing. It takes zero effort for you to keep your balance as you walk around the top. _'Sandwich place?'_

_'Sure.'_

You take a longer, deeper breath. You clench your fists tight enough to draw blood. You have a full week off. You might as well make the most of it.


	3. You're Not In Love With Anyone, 'Cause You're In Love WIth Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A stranger wakes up.

You wake up and your head's a mess. It takes a minute for you to wake up enough to realize that you're lying face-down in the middle of an alleyway. It takes another to finally will yourself up onto your arms, just enough to prop yourself up against a nearby wall.  
  
You don't remember how you got here. The last thing you remember is training a couple of magical girls...a couple of friends of...that's right.  
  
You had just met a new student. A new magical girl that had contracted with Kyubey just a couple of days ago. You thought she had potential, believed it with all your heart.  
  
Of course, you probably shouldn't be thinking of that now. You have a problem to deal with. You're in the middle of an alleyway in...you look into the skyline. You don't really recognize it in any real capacity. It looks completely unfamiliar and borderline _alien._  
  
The sea breeze smells like Kasamino, but nothing looks right. There's a massive radio tower, skyscrapers that didn't exist before. The mountainside, which you can barely see through the buildings, is covered in ruins. Bits of building that slammed into the face. You take a look to the side.  
  
 _"This girl seemed powerful...we don't have good information..."_ There's murmurings to your side. An errant whisper. You hear something about _no frame of reference_ and _notorious._  
  
Notorious? Probably. You might be notorious to _certain_ people.  
  
 _"Maybe Rin can...hold up, hold up she's up."_ At the end of the alleyway, a group of magical girls all stare at you. You clutch your head.  
  
"Where..." You lean against the wall. Your head's throbbing. You concentrate. Your instincts take a grip on you, keep you steady, keep you whole. You stand up straight, then you click your tongue and snap your fingers. Your hair promptly fixes itself. "Apologies for the disorganization, but where might I be?"  
  
"Uh." one of them, a short, turquoise-haired girl, presses her hand against the back of her head. "Kasamino. I brought you here."  
  
"Kasa...so this _is_ Kasamino." You look around. It really doesn't look all that familiar at all. It seems like Kasamino in name only.  
  
"I'm Yuri," she says. "This is Renko and Haruha and Neru and Miki." She points to each individual new girl with a pop in her step.  
  
Each of the girls waves at you. Honestly, you're still bewildered. You didn't even think you had a reputation at all.  
  
"Oh, we already know who you are," one of the girls says. She scratches the back of her head. "We kind of just heard of you through the grapevine."  
  
You blink. You're _still_ not used to this idea. "I do still find that utterly bizarre. I've merely survived."  
  
"Survival is its own feat, especially among magi."  
  
You've never heard that term before. You thought that you were simply _Magical Girls._ You off-handedly wonder if this is...no, that would be nonsense.  
  
But...but just in case. "I suppose I am just being paranoid, but what is today's date?"  
  
"September 28th. Why?""Of what year?" you ask.  
  
Yuri immediately sucks air in through her teeth and glances around. The other girls murmur among themselves, each of them mumbling something about information and other things that they somehow don't think you'll notice.  
  
"I'll find out what year _eventually."_ You raise the volume of your voice just a hair, but it's enough to make you sound less like a fifteen-year-old girl and more like a woman twice your age. You raise a hand. "I'm patient, yes, but there's a line between patience and withholding precious information."  
  
The girls move behind Yuri, who swallows and sighs. "Okay, yes." She breathes in.  
  
"2031. It's September 2031."  
  
You narrow your eyes. "Thank you for cooperating. Now tell me, what else do people know? And what does 'brought me here' mean?"  
  
"It refers to how I brought you over. I...okay, so, we need your help. There's something on the other side of the Kasamino bay, and we need the help of someone like you."  
  
"What about my skillset makes me qualified?" you say, still having difficulty grasping how much time has passed. Kasamino's changed a _lot_. "Especially given the trouble of pulling me into the future."  
  
"We just...yes, it's your skillset. Long-distance, area c-control, and a shocking amount of potential." Yuri's buckling under the pressure. You suspect she isn't normally the one to convince others. "You're versatile. Ridiculously so, and that was made clear with what they told m-me."  
  
You shrug it all off. "Okay, then what about 'brought me here'?" You loom over her. You're tall, abnormally tall for a Japanese teenager. You suppose that's from your father's side. "Is there a story behind _that?"_  
  
"I-I-I-!"  
  
"She means that she had to ask for your help from across timelines."  
  
You look up into the night sky. A woman descends from the moon, perfectly framed in your eye as she slowly approaches. Her six wings flap slowly as she drifts down from on high, a flickering halo floating just over her head with two spheres flipping about it.  
  
Yuri sighs in relief before quickly taking several steps out of this new woman's way. She's easily in her _twenties;_ you've _never_ seen a magical girl as old as she is before. She's stunningly beautiful, moving with an almost unnatural grace. It's as though her arms glide through the air and her feet tap against steps that aren't there.  
  


  
"I am Lady Rin, and I am sure you're very confused, being so far out of your time." She smiles. "Why don't I offer you some tea?"  
  
You stare up at her, eyes still narrowed. "That would be welcome, yes. Has tea changed much in the future?"  
  
"Hardly," she says. "English Breakfast?"  
  
"Irish, actually."  
  
"Ah, then I have that as well." She descends and stretches her hand forwards.  
  
You don't shake her hand back. "Where are we headed?"  
  
Rin smiles as softly as she can manage. It's a friendly, warm smile, but it puts you on edge. "We are headed to the bay. I have a beach home there that we can use to chat. A lovely balcony, as well."  
  


[=]  


Your name is Minako, and lunch is awkward. Lunch is extremely awkward. You scratch your head and keep your eyes traced on your mom as she orders a sandwich. Your mama has a BLT. You also just opted for a salad, and so did your girlfriend.  
  
There's not a whole lot of actual conversation going on. You're quietly chomping on a forkful of croutons and leaves while your mama bites into her sandwich and your mom swallows a bite full of jalapeno chicken. You can hear your fork scraping your bowl as you probably dive a little bit too deep into your salad. You glance at Takane.  
  
She's trying to look polite as she puts some of the salad into her mouth, but her fork is trembling. Like she's expecting something to explode.  
  
Finally, your mom stops biting into the sandwich. She actually hasn't had that much of it.  
  
"It is what it is." She raises her hands. "It is what it is and we're gonna deal. It's going to be fine."  
  
Your mama takes a bigger bite of her sandwich to try and ignore it. It takes all of your willpower not to cringe so hard that you implode because your mom is incredibly bad at lying. Even if you couldn't feel it screaming inside of her, feel the anguish, the urge to flip the table to cause a tempest and rip apart the restaurant and try to rip Kyubey asunder and cast it back into whatever hell it crawled out of.  
  
It's a burst of vivid blue, a torrent that turns into a tsunami as a three-eyed knight rides into the night, dragging the corpse of a white blob alongside it. You can hear violins screeching and cords wailing and you finally cut it off.  
  
The day's been vivid enough. You're still getting a handle on your powers and you've started to quiet them down even if just _a little_ bit. You turn to Takane.  
  
It's guilt. A sickly green that threatens to turn to sludge as it wraps around your ankles and swallows you whole. The mire is thick; the air feels as thick as water as a snake coils around and around and around and constricts you whole.  
  
You knock yourself out of that. This time, you manage to compose yourself enough that Takane doesn't recognize when you've felt her emotions. You smile at her.  
  
She doesn't smile back.  
  
Perhaps you didn't hide it well enough.  
  
Finally, your mama swallows the rest of the BLT...or at least she tries. She takes a glass of water and promptly _rinses_ her throat by awkwardly shoving the entire thing at her lips. After a few loud gulps, she puts it back down.  
  
"Right," your mama says. "We're fine."  
  
She's lying. Hellfire rises from her soul as the cross inverts. She was never a devout catholic; she admitted many times that she lapsed, but she still believed in God.  
  
And as above, so below. The pink eyes of Lucifer appear, a cat-like smile that turns into a mouth of sharp teeth and claws that threaten to devour you.  
  
It's so easy to insert yourself into all three of the visions; they are all, after all, about _you._  
  
Reality floods back in, and you're in the midst of another long pause. You shove some lettuce into your mouth again. It's plain and bland; you don't like having dressing on your food. But god, you want some kind of distraction.  
  
You swallow. "I...hm." You scratch at the table a little more. You don't feel very hungry anymore. Finally, you take a breath.

"Don't lie to me." You say it clearly. "I-I know when you're lying. I know and I know it well you can't hide that from me anymore." You look around the table. "I can sense that shit _really clearly."_  
  
Everyone freezes, before they all react in their own unique, equally terrible ways.  
  
Your mom presses her hands into her face as she remembers that your wish was to _understand._ And unfortunately you've had to do a lot of that over the past several hours.  
  
Your mama leans her cheek onto her hand and looks away. She looks like a guilty teenager rather than a thirty-four-year-old woman that just got caught lying to her child again. She sighs. "Fuck."  
  
Your girlfriend just looks disappointed in herself. Like she expected herself to be better than she was. "Sorry, Mina. You...you're right. I shouldn't have done that."  
  
At the very least you could build up the confidence to say _something,_ and that's not a small feat. But you don't even need to start using your powers to realize that you just made this awkward lunch even worse. You shouldn't have opened your stupid fucking mouth.  
  
"Right." You say. "Just...let's just eat. Right? Let's fucking eat."  
  
You stab the lettuce again. You want to scream into the bowl but you know that's stupid. What's less stupid is ignoring your problems, bottling them up and hoping they don't explode horribly later. That's a great idea, why didn't you think of doing that earlier?  
  
Except your mama doesn't let you do that. "I mean, you're right. You're right and I hate it."  
  
Your mom sighs. "Your wish was to understand, right? To _get_ us."  
  
You stab at the salad. You don't really answer.  
  
She continues. "Alright. Then I just...okay. Let's understand. I'll help you. You already know about the combat dangers. Being a magi is dangerous. You could get hurt. Fights are dangerous. Mitakihara witches have dismembered me..."  
  
You feel a chill run down your spine. She said it so casually that you wouldn't have noticed had your mom not paused. "Dis...dismembered?"  
  
"I didn't misspeak." She says. "I've had my arms removed more times than I can count. My legs have turned to paste. My spine was torn from my back. My jaw removed from my body. My eyes torn apart. Decapitated, pasted, destroyed from the neck-down with the exception of my soul gem because of a lucky save and some quick thinking. Though as the years have gone by, those injuries have rarer and rarer. I don't know if it's because I've gotten _better,_ or because I notice them less.  
  
"To be a magi is to be a warrior forever. No breaks. No vacation. Maybe you can relax a little bit. But at the cost of what? A witch eats a civilian or two. Another magi perishes in the fight. Another magi..."  
  
The ocean rages. A three-eyed helm stares at you from under the waves. Its hands grip a massive blade, bigger than the one your mother used to destroy the witch yesterday. It's looming, threatening to burst ahead from the waves, but age has dulled it. Its armor is rusted, and even this tiny glimpse shows that it can hardly move its sword. But yet it watches. It watches and watches, before dissolving into a mist.  
  
You're back in your seat. You shake your head. There's...  
  
Actually, truthfully, you have an idea of what that vision meant. There is always a meaning to it.  
  
But you really don't like that one. That one's probably the worst of them.  
  
You have a feeling you know what it is and it's one that you really, desperately want to be untrue.  
  
"Is born." Your mama finishes. "Kyubey thrives off of exploiting desperate people. It's how it gets its... _system_ going. It's built on lies, desperation, and exploitation and it's fucking evil."  
  
"Right." Your mom sighs. "It's evil. There is nothing else to say about it. It's hideous, warped, and made to intentionally exploit children who don't know any better."  
  
You wince.  
  
She notices you and looks away. Takane, meanwhile, looks away. She's not avoiding anyone's gaze in particular. She looks a million miles away, and before you can probe her, you lock onto your powers. You _stop._ You stop yourself from looking deeper because god _damn it_ you don't need to do that again.  
  
You need to keep a lock on it. You don't even know if you _can,_ but you best try. Because otherwise this power's going to blacken your gem far, far too quickly. You look back to your parents. They're probably talking to each other through brainspeak.  
  
Your hand wanders over to Takane's. She blinks. Then she notices you.  
  
Your power works again and you feel that warmth again. Her world is a bright, beautiful leafy green, with a purple glow in the center. A glow of You. She moves her hand towards yours and wraps her fingers around yours.  
  
You lean into her shoulder. "Let's go back to Akibazokuhen."  
  
"Isn't there a performance there tonight?" Takane says right back. "I heard there was something going on..."  
  
"Cool, then we have a thing to do when we're there." You move your lips to her shoulder and give it a kiss. It's a bit weird to kiss fabric but well, your girlfriend is cute and sweet and you want to be cute and sweet right back.  
  
It works. In her mind's eye, she's kissing you repeatedly, first on the nose, then the forehead, then your lips over and over. But she's in front of your parents. So instead, she opts for a kiss to the top of your head.  
  
Your parents look at one another. Your mom snickers a little bit. "Our child."  
  
"God they're so gay." Your mama laughs. "Oh, where did we go so wrong."  
  
"Before they were born." Your mom's voice is drier than the Sahara. "Is gay contagious?"  
  
"It's gotta be." Your mama swoons. "Oh noooo, what a tragedy."  
  
"Shhhutthefuckup." You wave your hand awkwardly at your parents.  
  
They chuckle a little bit. Your power works on accident again, and you can tell that it's a laugh laced with barbs and razor wire.  
  
But Akibazokuhen will be full of people. It's a good way to train yourself to block out the noise...it should be, anyway.  
  


[=]

  
It was not.  
  
Oh lord it was _not._  
  
You are currently in a sea of faces, in the middle of the neon-lit streets of Mitakihara's shopping district and it is _bustling._ Everyone is out for the street show; a spectacular, well-funded stunt extravaganza over the streets, as performers do death-defying stunts over a floating net. Everyone is watching with fear and trepidation, awe and wonder, and you'd really love to join them at some point.  
  
Because right now the roar of the crowd is fucking _deafening._  
  
Not only from the noise but the emotion from everyone. It's an eclectic mix; a maelstrom of anxieties and fears and self-loathing and the urge to buy and sell and buy and sell and colors just radiating over your body. The performers above can't hide their nerves, can't hide their fear of falling or embarrassment or just losing their goddamn jobs.  
  
You feel it all perfectly.  
  
Your arms are wrapped around your girlfriends' arm as tight as you can manage. It's a vice grip. if she weren't a magi, you're probably sure that it'd be snapping her arm right about now.  
  
Takane, for her part, just strokes your hand. She keeps you close, keeps you nearby. "We can leave if you want." She whispers. "Mina, you look terrible."  
  
"I-I'm _fine!"_ You lie, unconvincingly. "I just-!"  
  
"You don't need to act strong. I already know you are. But I don't think we should have tried this quite yet."

"You're right. You're right and we need to l-leave." You stare at her. "W-where do we go?"  
  
"We can head back to the park by the school."  
  
You're beginning to realize that the park might be one of your favorite places to just go. "Y-yeah, yeah it would be. And at this time of night-"  
  
"Nobody else will be there. Or, at least, it'll be a manageable number," she says with a smile.  
  
Leaving Akibazokuhen is like having a weight lifted off of your soul. The night is lit by the occasional street lamp, with maybe a passing car or two as you and Takane walk across the road. Eventually, as the pounding headache subsides, you take a deep, relaxed breath.  
  
Takane's grip slackens a little as she realizes you're relaxed. You then free yourself from her grip and [dash ahead](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1igFHIITh0) as quickly as your powerful new legs can allow.  
  
She looks shocked, before you whip yourself around and beckon her to follow you. A step, then two, then you do a _soaring_ leap into the sky. You don't look back; you know she's following you.  
  


  
Well, at first. You turn back to give her a glowing smile. She looks absolutely shocked as you pirouette over a power line and bounce off of a wall. She grins right back.  
  
You're getting the hang of this magi shit. At least the jumping part. You slide across a wall, but perhaps you go a little too deep; your feet drag across the brick and carve out a chunk of it. Your shoes just barely hold together as you stumble out of a dive, but you quickly grab another power line and swing underneath. You know your path; you can predict how you're going to jump now.  
  
So you show off by turning that powerline swing into a triple backflip. You land on an air conditioning unit, soft enough not to damage the damn thing this time, and quickly step to the side before doing a spectacular running jump off the rooftop.  
  
"You're doing great!" Takane shouts.  
  
 _"Fuck yeah I am!"_ You cross your arms over your chest for a roll, then spread them like you're taking flight.  
  
It takes another few minutes for you to reach the park, and you do so by hitting the ground hard enough to crater the grass. A woman walking her dog just jumps in shock before quickly walking off.  
  
Takane follows right behind you, but she fires a few shots while descending. A few loud _pops_ and her momentum is slow enough that she can lightly tap the ground.  
  
The park isn't terribly crowded, but there _is_ an event tonight. A small meeting between the members of a neighboring apartment complex for movie night. They're watching an old live-action _Sailor Moon_ movie for...some reason.  
  
You glance back to Takane, and this time the feelings from the crowd are far, far milder. It's not as over-the-top as what you experienced back in Akibazokuhen, not as extreme, but still a myriad of emotions. Mostly disgust, boredom and a deep, deep love for an anime.  
  
Takane grasps your shoulders, whispering, "Pay attention to me. Focus on _me_."  
  
You take a deep breath. It takes a second...but then you manage. You keep your eyes shut as you focus on the green in front of you. The beautiful, beautiful green of the girl you've only known for a few days. But goddamn you like her a lot.

She is a field that's been ravaged by construction. A great scaffold towers over a plain, bricks only just been laid, a foundation that's never been touched. There's a tower to the sky, dim clouds flying overhead before shattering into nothingness. The scaffolding stretches miles into the atmosphere, cutting a path through the clouds as they slowly drift through it.  
  
The plain is surrounded by marsh. You take a step back only to realize this plain has a floor of mud and mush. You stare back upwards.  
  
And what do you see but two pink eyes?  
  
You flash back into reality. Your world floods back into the smell of Takane's hair as she holds you tight. You don't remember hugging her before you entered the emotionscape (you're gonna call it that until you think of a better name). But you don't mind.  
  
You hold her right back and give her a kiss on the cheek. "I can deal with this."  
  
"Good." She leans her head into your cheek. "We will have to practice a little more, though. I don't think you can keep missing school."  
  
"Right. Shit." You sigh. "Fucking..."  
  
"Hey, hey, it's not going to be that bad. Just try to focus on me, and maybe Reika. Your friends love you, too; they'd be willing to help." Takane squeezes. "You'll be okay, Mina."  
  
You really hope so. You glance back. "Hey, so...when should we try hunting?"  
  
"Witch hunting?" Takane asks. Her emotionscape turns darker. The sun descends, replaced by a blood-red moon.  
  
"Yeah. I need to do it at _some_ point."  
  
"Right," she mutters. "Right, you do. But you're not going alone." She strokes your hair.  
  
"I wouldn't dream of it."


	4. Anywhere But Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sayaka and Kyouko flirt, a stranger meets an angel, and Minako creeps onto an unsettling truth.

  


Your name is Sayaka. And right now you're in your wife's arms, resting underneath a concrete bridge at the edge of town. You and Kyouko are cuddling at the ledge, feet dangling as you both look out over the bay.  
  
This part of the bridge is an outcropping just underneath the walkway. No ordinary person could possibly make it here without risking life and limb. It's noisy and obnoxious, with the sound of trains passing and cars roaring overhead. But you know this place well.  
  
Too well. Kyouko's carved a little heart just overhead with the head of her spear, with a script just above that reads 'koko wuz here'. Several little hearts, each marking a separate time you and her have...well...fucked.  
  
You've fucked here. Several times before.  
  
It's the dead of night. Your kid's probably still on their date. Your wife traces a hand around your jaw, before you turn your head and give the palm of her hand a kiss.  
  
Finally, after half an hour of quiet, Kyouko asks, "Are we gonna be alright?"  
  
You stare into the bay. You wrack your brain through a number of different answers. _Maybe_ pops up. _Yes_ vanishes with the waves. _No..._ is tempting, but you haven't given up before. It's how magi survive as long as you have.  
  
So you settle on that. "I don't know." You turn your head up. "I have no clue."  
  
"I was hopin' you'd have a better answer than _that,_ Saya."  
  
"Too bad. I'm just as terrified as you are." You wiggle a little. "Yesterday feels like it was years ago."  
  
"That was nice." Kyouko sighs. "But Mina is taking well to their powers. _Too_ well."  
  
"Yeah, it'll be harder for me to lie. Poorly." You rub your thumb against her knuckles. "Is harder, rather."  
  
"Heh." Kyouko rubs her hand across your stomach. "I wanna do you."  
  
"Not here and not at home." You sigh. "And I don't feel okay with leaving Mina alone tonight."  
  
"I know, I know. But it's still, just, we haven't fucked since the anniversary and I'm horny and sad and that's a bad fuckin' combo."  
  
You sigh. "I know, and I get it, Koko. But we can wait. Even if just a little."  
  
"Yeah, I knoooooow." She kisses the back of your neck.  
  
"...do you think Mina knows about witches already?"  
  
"I hope not. But Takane's probably already figured it out." Kyouko moves her chin to your shoulder. "She's a smart cookie. Too smart." She pauses again. "Okay, don't hate me for this suggestion, but..."  
  
"No."  
  
"You didn't even let me say anything."  
  
"I don't want Homura over. Homura doesn't want to come over. I'm surprised she's back in Japan but I don't think she wants to come back to Mitakihara."  
  
"But she still has expertise. And I think 'hey our kid contracted' is the kind of threshold that warrants having her visit."

"With a mind controller and our kid being an empath, I really don't think bringing crazy auntie Homu is a good idea."  
  
"Yeah I didn't think so. Still felt like it was worth askin'." Her hands trace your stomach. "Hey, did you know that you're cute? Kinda think ya needed to know."  
  
"Yeah I knew that." You look out to the bay. "And I'd rather our meeting with her not be because I ordered her to come back. Homura's been-" self-absorbed, obnoxious, controlling, a bad partner, a worse friend, "-a handful. Always been a handful."  
  
"You could say 'raging bitchotron'."  
  
"That works," you say, snickering before your mirth fades off into a sigh."Did we ever get the full story about how Madoka broke up with her?"  
  
"Nah." Kyouko shrugs. "I mean, I got some of it from Homura but that source is kinda biased. She was wrecked."  
  
"I thought she was going to jump to another loop."  
  
"Same." Kyouko sighs. "I thought that's what happened. That she just left the timeline forever and tried getting a shiny new Madoka."  
  
You pause. "Shit, what if she and Madoka get back together?"  
  
Kyouko winces in the corner of your eye.  
  
"Yeah, that's my feeling, too."  
  
"They're just real bad for each other. Least I thought so."  
  
"Hey, so...actually..." You bite your lip and wriggle against her. "Hrmmmmm."  
  
"Wassit? Are you still thinking about bringing Homu?"  
  
"Nah. I'm pretty sure bringing her is a bad idea. It's just..." You wriggle a little more. "Yeah, I'm pretty horny too."  
  
"Really? Are you sure? You're not just-"  
  
"I'm not just saying that because you wanted it, Kyouko. I'm saying it because I'm sitting on a ledge with my wife."  
  
"You're sure? You're not just-"  
  
"For the love of god I want you to rail me on this bridge." You grab her hand and move it right to your chest. "Please?"  
  
Kyouko smiles into the crook of your neck. "Yeah." You turn your head to meet her lips. You kiss with twenty years' worth of familiarity. "But you gotta beg."  
  
You laugh as soon as your lips separate. "Always, Koko."  
  


[=]  


You follow Rin down the road. It's a quiet walk, a beautiful moonlit stroll down an empty, dingy sidewalk. The air is thick with smog. You've always thought of Kasamino as a rough town, but this? This is the worst it's ever been.  
  
It's worse than how it was when Kyouko lived here. When you had to visit her...family. You shake your head. That's something you'd rather not think about right now.  
  
"But why a magical girl like myself?" you ask. "Anyone can have a power set like mine. And firearms aren't a rare weapon type."  
  
"But you are astute. You're observant. You're unusual in how long you lasted." Rin smiles back. "Two years is no small feat."  
  
"I was told that was average by our mutual...pest."  
  
Rin nods. You wish you could read her mind, see what she's thinking. "Ah, but that number is heavily warped. It's an average, in that it is a mean. It's not average as in 'the norm'. Magical girls don't tend to last long. They live for a few weeks, then they die."  
  
You glance away and squeeze your eyes shut. "Hrm."  
  
"Or worse," Rin says. "Do you know the ultimate-"  
  
"I do," you interrupt. "I know it. I don't need to be reminded of how our lives are designed to go."  
  
Rin chuckles. "Ah, yes. Good. Then you know more than I was expecting you to." She turns back. "Most girls don't react well to the news."  
  
"Who said that I did?"  
  
"Most girls either kill themselves or _hatch_ , as the Incubators call it. As though they are the chrysalis from which an adult emerges."  
  
You shudder. "It is evil. The most evil fate I could imagine."  
  
"Perhaps it is. It was one of the biggest threats in Kasamino before I contracted just a few short years ago."  
  
You narrow your eyes. You really, _really_ don't like this. "What did you do?"  
  
"Simple. I brought order and cooperation where there once wasn't any. This town was much like other cities. A death trap for civilians and magical girls alike. Kasamino in particular was hellish. And then-"  
  
"You came along?"  
  
"Yes." She smiles. "I halt the grief in their gems. What was once unsustainable becomes easy. There were once only fifteen magical girls in this town. There are now forty of them, living together in harmony."  
  
You narrow your eyes.  
  
She pauses for a while, waiting for your response. Except she answers your question before you ask it. "Yes, it does sound too good to be true, doesn't it? I don't blame you. The Incubators harden everyone. It makes you look for a catch. As though simple altruism is impossible. But I can tell you that your cynicism is misplaced."  
  
"It's not cynicism when it's built on experience."  
  
"Is it?" Rin glances towards you out the corner of her eye. "I believe that's just another vector. Another way to avoid dealing with your problems. I understand my problems. And I understand how to fix mine, but it takes time and effort and a little bit of help."  
  
You look away. "I don't need help. Did you not summon me because you needed my ability? Why are you waxing lyrical? Do you want me to converse faster? We could just jump to your home-"  
  
"Time is of the essence, but I planned ahead. We are well within my planned schedule. Besides, I want to know the magical girls in my city. Even those who are simply passing through." She smiles. "Yuri invites them over; she brings magical girls from other timelines into ours, and then when they are done helping, we send them home. It's simple, clean, and it works. We bring them over, they help us out, then we send them back home."  
  
"Huh." You blink. "Then...what's the catch with that?"  
  
"The catch?" She frowns. "The catch is that the magical girl cannot be alive in our world. Two of the same souls cannot exist at the same time. It's an ironclad rule of our universe; one soul at a time. Only one of each person, only one of each magical girl. And each has a near-infinite variation, as unique and different as the human experience."  
  
"Then I was-"  
  
"Dead," she says, simply. "You died twenty years ago. And you were brought here, at the precise age that you had perished at. Fifteen years old."  
  
You stop in your tracks. "O-Oh."

You watch Rin walk away. She didn't stop even though she heard you stop moving. A second passes. Then two. Then you start to walk right after her. You don't want to be left behind.  
  
"If you have that many girls, what do you need me for?"  
  
"Because Mitakihara has nearly sixty girls at its disposal, and every single one counts. I do not wish for a war, but tensions are rising. Especially with the women in charge over there."  
  
"So you want us to be your shock troopers."  
  
"I want you to be our assistance. Scouting, deterrence, and should it come to it, combat."  
  
"Do you expect me to kill?"  
  
"No. But I hope for you to be prepared to."  
  
You grimace.  
  
"Ah, you've killed before?"  
  
You don't answer her. Your fingers feel warm and wet, and it takes you a second to realize that you clenched your hand so tightly that you opened the skin on your palm. You loosen your grip, and your natural healing starts to close the wound. Hopefully she hasn't noticed.  
  
"We can clean your hand when we get to the beach house, alright?"  
  
Of course she noticed. Of course she did. You might as well ask another question. You don't want to think about how you had to kill a magical girl who tried to forcibly witch out her friend. Or how you had to...  
  
"What do your 'guests' get in return?" Your voice shakes as the words leave your mouth.  
  
"A return home, and a paused gem. I can prevent grief accumulation near-permanently. It's how we have so many magical girls in this city. We don't have the same...advantages that Mitakihara has."  
  
"Do they farm witches?"  
  
"No. But that would not be out of the question for them." She turns to face you, with a faint frown and a grimace. "They have the seed of Walpurgisnacht."  
  
"Wal...wait, _what?"_  
  
"Twenty years ago, one of their strongest magi, the current leader of Mitakihara's magical girls, managed to kill the worst witch that history had yet seen. And afterwards, over the course of two decades, she took over the city. She rules over Mitakihara with an iron fist and her wife by her side."  
  
"Do you have a name?"  
  
"Of course." She turns to face you; the moonlight frames her face as she gives you an ice-cold stare. You can feel shivers run down your spine as she finally tells you.  
  
"Her name is Sayaka Miki-Sakura. And her wife is Kyouko."  
  


[=]  


Your name is Minako, and you're currently in school. Your parents came home _late_ last night, which was fine by you. You were out late with your girlfriend, and that was enough to give you a focus.  
  
School was a little bit hazardous at first; you had to stop feeling the emotions of every repressed, angry teenager around, and it took the help of your girlfriend to finally get a handle on it.  
  
And truthfully you still need it. Class today is particularly boring; you've never really had to pay attention in school, because usually class is kind of a cakewalk for you. So your mind wanders.  
  
And when your mind wanders, you start to sense how much the girl behind you is thinking about the boy she likes (and how she doesn't actually know him that well), or Hiro, who is worrying about Reika, who is...well...  
  
Well, she's still thinking about what happened two days ago. You can tell, because you see a golden crown and a kettle-like breastplate. You really, _really_ hope she doesn't contract.  
  
Finally, though, you lock right back onto Takane. Your world turns green once more, with a flash of purple. You take a deep breath. Takane is calm. You're calm. You're in the middle of a massive plain with that beautiful scaffold. Wind blows across, the world is...well, it's everything you need it to be right now.  
  
"Minako Miki-Sakura."  
  
You freeze in place. In front of you the teacher stares you down, one hand on the board, the other on a book. The other students look mortified, and the teacher, a man who's shorter than both your parents, balding, half Filipino and half Okinawan, presses his hand onto the board.  
  
"Mind giving us an explanation of the themes that the late Le Guin was trying to explore in this short story?"  
  
You cough. "Yes, sir." You quickly look over the board. You were in the middle of a literature lesson...a lesson about...uh...fuck, what was the reading? Another quick glance. It's about the short story you were assigned. It was pretty shockingly depressing...right, _right._  
  
"Ultimately, she's trying to bring up a point about cost and benefit...well, no, maybe not that, but I mean, how the suffering of one can be weighed against the needs of many. One person suffers but everyone else benefits. One person experiences perpetual, horrible, unjust, uh, fuckin'-"  
  
"Language, Miki-Sakura, but continue."  
  
You blush"-frickin' torment. The child has done nothing to deserve his treatment, nothing to deserve abuse or perpetual pain. Nothing but being unlucky enough to be the victim of Omelas. But when people see the child, they're faced with the dilemma of uh, 'is it okay for this child to suffer so we can all benefit?'"  
  
There's a long, long pause as the man nods, considering what you just said. He draws it out agonizingly slowly, one headbob, then two, then three, then he finally presses his hand against the board. "Excellent job, Miki-Sakura. However, there is also another point that Ursula may have wanted to bring up. Does anyone else have a theme that they believe the story is trying to..."  
  
You close your eyes. That was kind of a welcome distraction. You take a side glance towards Takane.  
  
 _'You're doing great.'_ She gives you a broad grin.  
  
You nod back. _'Doesn't feel it.'  
  
'I mean, you did your homework, so that helped, but you're doing really, really well. Better than last night.'  
  
'My brain feels like jelly.'_  
  
She audibly sighs. _'Okay, let's talk a little bit on the roof, okay? But I do mean it. You're doing a great job, Mina.'_

You're lying on your back on the rooftop, your head in Takane's lap as she strokes your hair. On the ground are two empty bento boxes. It's a pleasant day, not too hot, not so cold as to need a jacket.  
  
It's perfect, so that means something's going to fuck it up. And you don't know if it's going to be you or a witch. Maybe a combination of the two. It'll be fucking great.  
  
You raise your arms and weakly bat at Takane's face. She sighs. "I did mean it. You're doing great, especially for someone who just started two days ago."  
  
"Is that 'cause most magi would be dead in two days or because I'm good?"  
  
Takane frowns. She frowns so hard you can feel the plain in her emotionscape make a convex curve. "Please don't be fatalistic."  
  
"Sorry, sorry. But it's because I'm good, right?"  
  
"It's because you're good, Mina."  
  
"Yeh."  
  
"But you still have a long road ahead."  
  
"Fuck."  
  
You then feel something. Not a _good_ something, but a _something_ nonetheless. You immediately shoot upright and dart your eyes around, looking for where _that_ is coming from. You can't really describe it; it's like something is pulling on the soul gem around your finger, but not physically.  
  
"Witch?" Takane asks.  
  
So _that's_ what the feeling is. "Yeah," you breathe out and pull yourself onto your feet, "that's a witch."  
  
You flex your hands. You guess now is the time to figure _this_ part out, too. You crack your neck and face your girlfriend and...  
  
Oh. The scaffold is shuddering. Pieces are falling from it. Her plain is blowing and wind whips everything into a frenzy.  
  
"You don't want me to go."  
  
Takane is caught off-guard before she hisses under her breath. She probably thought she could hide that feeling even from _you._ And she said she was _confident_ in you earlier.  
  
Christ, everyone's still lying to you.

You choke back the urge to scream at her for lying to you. She's worried about you. She likes you a lot. Maybe even loves you. Pretty cool after just a few short days of relationship. She just wants you safe. She wants to keep you from getting too badly hurt.  
  
You can tell that much; her mindscape is smoldering. The scaffold shudders as the wind whips the clouds overhead and turns the sky itself grey. Focusing on her gives you a clearer picture of how she works, how she thinks, how she feels.  
  
You give her a thin smile. "Well, how about this? We fight with a safety net. If things get too fucky, pull me out. Okay?"  
  
"I'll do that," she says as she stands up. You can tell, even without your powers, that she's not happy about it, but she still gives you a small smile.  
  
"Thank you." You stand up after her. "Hey, uh, also do you mind if I uh...give you-"  
  
She pecks you on the lips before you finish asking. You give her a grin, immediately bend your knees, and _leap._ The force is enough to shatter concrete and send you flying upwards into the sky. Your senses pull you towards wherever the witch is, across the park, past your apartment complex, then eastward into the Mall of Mitakihara.  
  
You narrow your eyes. You can _see_ the grief seed on top of the parking lot next to the main building; it's a tiny little structure, narrow and thin, solid concrete and steel shaped into a ribbed cylinder to make it look less jarring next to the mall. You slide across its top, then jump down the hole that runs down the center of the cylinder.  
  
You can hear cars humming as you descend. Engines rumble faintly, tires squeal, engines die and start, all of the noise echoing at you as you descend further and further. The light around you turns orange, then red.  
  
[Five floors down](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BmqGtZtDGk), and you stop falling through a concrete spiral and start falling through an empty piston. Asphalt becomes glimmering chrome. Faint clanging turns into cacophonous ringing and grinding, machinery slamming into metal as smoke clouds your vision.  
  
You come to a stop on a radiator that's bigger than a car. Your school shoes struggle to keep a grip before you realize that you should probably transform.  
  
A second later, and you pull your mask over your face, pull your hoodie over your hair, and slam your bat into the ground. You stare into the mechanical hellscape before you as smoke clouds your vision and wisps overhead.

The engines rumble all around you, each in constant motion. You find it hard to keep your balance even with your boots gripping the floor with as much strength as they can muster.  
  
"Holy shit."  
  
"Every witch is different," Takane says. "But they always look...different. Like they don't belong."  
  
"Like a collage." Your foot slides across the surface again. You tap it; it's solid. Rock-solid, even. You see fans whirring overhead before the radiator hisses and huffs.  
  
"Watch your step." Takane steps forwards, eyes down as she steps over the surface. She only takes a few short hops, as though she knows jumping too high will attract... _something._  
  
You step ahead. One step. Then two. Then three. The world is heavy. The engines instill terror in you. It's so fucking _loud._ You stare around you, then take a leap ahead.  
  
And then it hits you. You stumble across another engine as soon as you land, the feelings overwhelming, the power _too much._ Your mind grows dimmer and dimmer as Takane stops. "Huh, Mina?!"  
  
You fall to your knees as sweat beads on your forehead, as the engines underneath your knees rumble and tumble and roar and scream and something else is screaming too. Something else is there. It's more than the witch.  
  
Your mind turns red. Your vision turns black. And then you see a human face.  
  
Distorted, scratched, screaming in a language that sounds like it should be Japanese. Sounds like it should be _something._ Perfect, lucid screams of agony, teeth of gears that turn further abstract. Engines running against each other in a maelstrom of sound and noise and nonsense.  
  
Blood-red rage fills your head. You want to rip into something, tear it to shreds. You feel like you're about to shed your skin, tear apart the labyrinth and whatever else is unlucky enough to fall into this hell.

  


And then it stops. Takane grips your shoulders. "Mina!" She rushes to your side. "You okay?! Did your powers-"  
  
"I'm _fine."_ You wave at her. "It's fine, I'm fine, it's _nothing."_ You're hyperventilating. That vision was less than a split second but your chest is still heaving, your breath is still heavy, your heart is still beating in your chest. Your left hand is gripping the floor underneath, your right holding onto your bat so tightly that you think it's going to crush the handle.  
  
Takane lets her grip go. "But you...you felt the witch, didn't you?"  
  
"I felt it, yeah." You breathe in. "Monsters are fucking weird," you hiss.  
  
"Mina-"  
  
"Let's kill it. Kill it fast."  
  
You didn't notice that the second eye on your chest is open, this time with a blood-red glow. Two of the three eyes are wide-open, glancing wildly around at the barrier.  
  
But, as it turns out, you stopped locking onto the witch as soon as you came in here. You can still feel the anger, but something seems to have stopped it. You didn't know your powers had a safety...or maybe they don't.  
  
You're bristling a little. You feel a little more irritable, a little bit angrier, and you don't know why. You clench your teeth as you grip your bat, as you take a look at the greater Engine in the sky, at where the witch probably resides, wherever it came from.  
  
You breathe in again. That quirk of yours is probably something you'll have to look into at some point. And there's the matter of that _thing_ you suspected.  
  
Witches have a pretty complex mental hellscape. Each is different, each varies wildly. You glance at Takane, and the uppermost eye on your chest turns green.  
  
Her plain holds a shattered soul gem among a scaffold that's been blasted apart into splinters and wood and metal.  
  
And in the center, an orb of pitch-black.  
  
You clench your teeth and set your jaw.  
  
She suspects the same thing you do.  
  
"Let's focus," she says.

"Yeah, but...first." You turn back towards the witch's labyrinth and take a deep breath, two eyes open on your chest. You focus...you close the eyes on your face and open the ones in your mind.  
  


  


This was a mistake. Three eyes open for a split second before all three of them shut, but what you see is a nightmare. The screaming face gets more definition. The voice becomes more human, almost comprehensible. The labyrinth around you twitches, the engines overhead split in half and the witch howls from across the chamber.  
  
Your bat clatters across the ground and the mental force is enough to force you off your feet and flat on your back. You grunt in pain before two of the eyes slowly open back up. Their pupils are dilated, your own wide.  
  
The entire labyrinth around you flickers. The engines around you scream as the pistons, which should be perfectly aligned, jam themselves. Smoke begins to fill the chamber, and as you stand up, you breathe some in and cough and _cough._  
  
Takane holds your shoulder. _'Holy smokes, are you okay?!'_  
  
Her complete inability to swear is adorable. "Yeah I'm good I'm fuckin' _good._ I said I was good the _first time."_ You cough and hack and pull yourself up using your bat as a cane. "What did that look li-" You cough mid-sentence. The smoke is bad. It's _real bad.  
  
'Don't breathe in. You don't need to breathe.'_  
  
You blink, then force yourself to stop breathing. God, magi are bizarre. _'Okay, I'm not breathing now. The fuck did that look like though?'  
  
'One second you were closing your eyes. The next your chest burst into light and sent you sprawling backwards.'  
  
'Cool. That's fucking great.'_  
  
Your eyes are refocusing. You're back to the ambient anger. Except, well, again, the witch is corrupted. Random squares of the witch overhead seem to be misplaced. The entire labyrinth seems to be glitching right the fuck out, turning random colors as the air grows black with smoke.  
  
Then, finally, it all settles. The squares return to their rightful places, but the damage is already done. The engines around you no longer work. The cacophony's ceased, for better or for worse.  
  
Actually, you hear the witch scream, and without the clouding in your mind, it's crystal-clear. The thing bashes against the dead machinery, horribly loud when there's nothing left to drown it out. The creature rises among the mechanical mess. A spine dangles underneath, with a rubber hose and metal organs all held together by wires. The closer you look, the more you realize that they're a perfect representation of a human digestive tract. There's a stomach made of a fender, intestines out of a radiator, a shredded metal ribcage and lungs of rubber that breathe in and out, in and _out._  
  
The head is a bald skull with smoke whisping from openings in its skullplate, a pair of headlights in the eyesockets. Upon closer inspection, the skull is made of well-sculpted car parts. It glides over the machinery as the red glow turns black, and all that illuminates the world around you are the literal headlights of the witch.  
  


  
The eyes flicker around, the lights bouncing across the metal as it desperately searches for the bastard that stopped its noise. Your power works involuntarily. It's a beast of anger, a creature of rage and machinery. It feels nothing but _hate,_ hate so powerful it threatens to dig into your skull and turn you into a beast yourself.  
  
"Fuck."


	5. Legend Has It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minako comes to a harrowing realization.

The witch then stops searching. It darts its head right towards you, and the headlights illuminate the engine that you're hiding behind.  
  
It makes a mechanical screeching sound before it twists its head around and _dives.  
  
'Mina-!'  
  
'Don't worry,' _you spit out your mouth to get some of the soot out, _'I got this.'_  
  
You bend your knees and _leap._ The engine just underneath you explodes into a shower of parts, smoke, and angry witch as it plows through the nightmare and roils overhead. It's easily as big as two buses stapled end-over-end, its teeth rattling against its mouth, its jaw wide open and tongue lolling freely.  
  
You roll your bat around your hand and slap it against your shoulder.  
  
"Come _on,_ you _bitch!"_ You snarl with the kind of hate that you didn't know you were capable of, your feet widen their stance, you grab the bat with both your hands.  
  
You're gonna home-run this fucking witch into next _wee_ ohwow this is a really hard metal surface-  
  
Before you could even swing the bat, the witch has already slammed you into you at high speed. Metal dents around you with the force as the witch twists and turns and howls and screams. It arches, and momentum carries you off of its forehead and sends you careening through an engine block. The blow knocks the damn thing off of the cavern ceiling and sends it crashing to the ground.  
  
_'It doesn't look like you got it!'_  
  
"I am _fucking fine!"_ You pull yourself out of the wreckage and swing the bat out. You're seeing red again, and you don't know if that's the cavern, the witch, or the humiliation of getting the shit kicked out of you in front of your girlfriend. You press the bat into the cavern wall and use the force to wrench yourself out of the metal.  
  
It's enough to tear a gash across your shoulder. You wince at that, before you shut your eyes and close off the pain. The bleeding's not important. You can ignore that. You're busy trying to kill a witch. You swing the bat out to the side, raise it over your head, and grab it with both hands as gravity sends you careening downwards at high speed.  
  
Then the witch stares at you with its headlight eyes. The light's bright enough to blind you, throwing you off your downward swing and right into its jaws.  
  
At least, that was its plan. It's interrupted when a series of tiny shells knock it to the side, followed soon by a _snap._  
  
The witch is knocked aside in a billowing cloud of smoke, the head dragging across another engine block and scraping its burning, semi-molten side with a howl of pain and indignation.  
  
You hit the ground hard enough to shatter a fan blade and knock the wheel off its belt. The entire thing rocks under the force as you pull yourself out of the wreckage.  
  
You stare upwards at the witch as it howls in pain, as it retches and screeches and glares towards your girlfriend.  
  
You're stuck in the gears...a horribly inexperienced magi against what seems to actually be a kinda tough fight.

You grunt. _'Hey, Takane?'  
  
'Mina!' _she shouts as she blocks another charge from the witch. _'Are you alright?!'  
  
'Yeah. Got a plan? Shit, I hope you fucking do-'  
  
'I can distract the witch!' _she shouts at you. _'Do you have anything in your bat, something-'_  
  
The witch's jaw unhinges with a shrill, metallic _shriek,_ interrupting both your thoughts _._  
  
"Oh, _shoot."_  
  
It dashes right towards Takane, just as she fires an incendiary round right into its mouth. Flames lick the top of its mouth, smoke and sparks billowing out the sides and rattling around its teeth as it draaaaaaaags its face across a metal surface.  
  
Meanwhile you claw your way out of the machinery. The bat's in your hand but it feels way, way lighter for some reason.  
  
And easier to swing around with just your wrist and...oh no nonono.  
  
Ah, fuck. _Please don't be broken please don't be broken please don't be-_  
  
You look to your right to see the handle of your bat. And it _is_ shorter...but with a caveat. There's a massive tangle of razor wire inside, uncoiling as you pull for a second. You blink twice, then you _yank_ the entire thing out.  
  
A series of segments all pull themselves out of the wreckage in a spectacular arc of razor wire and gigantic metal segments. The weight is almost enough to pull you off-balance and send you sideways, but by virtue of your already-impressive strength and the grip of your boots, you manage to keep yourself steady.  
  
You whip the bat around your head, bring the tip of it into the ground, then _press._ The entire thing makes a series of little _clickclackclickclackclicks_ before it comes together with a loud, chunky **_ker-CHUCK._**  
  
You keep your eyes glued to it, then you sloooowly raise your head.  
  
[_'Yeah, I think I got something.'_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaPrQa3oMy0)  
  
You throw the bat forward, and with a quick twist of the wrist and a squeeze, it clacks apart into a heavy, razor-sharp whip. The witch turns to face the source of the noise before the heavy head of your bat lodges itself in one of its rubber lungs. It recoils, howling in pain as it begins to rotate its body.  
  
And, of course, you're way lighter. The force yanks you off of your feet and into the sky. The witch spins once, then twice, before the third spin rips the tip of your bat out of the body with a shower of nuts, bolts, rivets, and pieces of rubber.  
  
You hit another engine, but this time you're prepared. Your feet tap against metal as you slow yourself to a halt and stabilize your stance. As soon as you know you're safe, you turn back to the witch, only to get sprayed in the face by oil.  
  
You swear and try to wipe it off of your face, and after a couple of swipes you manage to get a good look at where the fuck it came from.  
  
It's gushing out of the newly-made hole in the witch's lung, and it's _everywhere._ The witch thrashes around, less in pain and more in humiliation and _rage;_ you can feel it even when you're not trying to, and you can feel your hands twitching and shaking with each thrash of the witch. After a few seconds of chaotic lurching, the witch promptly grabs its own lung with its teeth and _tears_ it out of its chest.  
  
It chatters its teeth together as its eyes narrow and the wide beams of light turn into red-hot _lasers,_ then it glares at its own ruined lung.  
  
The pitch-black chamber turns a hellish orange as a fireball blasts open the lung, showering you and Takane with flaming car parts. She fires a shield, while you just frantically pat yourself down to keep yourself from igniting. "Shit, shit, holy fuck I'm on _fire_ holy-"  
  
Your eyes widen, then you _immediately_ bend your knees and let gravity take you onto your back. The witch sails just inches over your head; the ribcage rubs against the tip of your hood and the glow from your soul gem illuminates its belly in a pink-red glow.  
  
A split-second, and you notice more organs, and with that split-second, you can also smell gasoline.  
  
_'Hey, I think I got an idea...'_  
  
On instinct, you stretch your hand out and grab a rubber intestine.  
  
The witch howls in pain once more as you're pulled off of the ground and into the air. You turn to see it trying to slam its body into more engines or spin itself to throw you away again, but this time you're prepared.  
  
_'Is it full of fuel?'_ Takane watches you from the side, quickly reloading her arm-guns with more incendiary rounds.  
  
Good, she was thinking _exactly_ what you were thinking.  
  
"Yeah, this witch is a _giant fucking bomb!"_  
  
You let go of the intestines, throw your bat out to the side, and kick off with a momentum-building spin right into the witch. It twists and turns, trying to pivot its spine towards you, but you're using a bat. And even with the spine in the way, it's long enough to wrap around the spine and embed itself right into the stomach.  
  
A split-second later, and the head splits, revealing a circular sawblade.  
  
And then you pull.

  


  
The blade of your bat screams with effort as it chews into the stomach and spills an mix of petroleum and gasoline. Hot steam spews out of the stomach, rubber melting and engine parts hanging as the witch screeches. The engine that is its heart screams as it tries to make up for lost pressure and the witch begins to falter and fall.  
  
It's having a hard time keeping itself up.  
  
_Perfect._  
  
"Takane, _fire!"_  
  
She fires a single shot. It arches through smoke and haze with its own trail of white sparks and smoke, then connects with the gas tank.  
  
Petroleum and petrol burst. The rubber goes ablaze as the gas roars into another spectacular fireball. You can feel the heat even through your layers of clothing, even through your _fucking mask,_ as the engine sputters and chokes and the witch's jaw unhinges and falls off its body. The entire creature stutters and screams, before the lights on its head dim and die.  
  
The barrier fades away before the witch even has a chance to hit the ground.  
  
You and Takane find yourselves on the ground floor of the parking garage, right in the middle of the complex. You're both standing on a gazebo in the center of the garage, in the middle of a tiny zen garden. The grief seed gently floats down from where the witch just was with a slow spin. It's a beautiful little thing, with a tiny gear atop it.  
  
You grab it before it hits the ground.  
  
"Well, not bad for my first fight," you say, still panting. The rage died with the witch; as soon as it burst into flames, your connection snapped away. "Shit."  
  
Takane nods as she falls to her knees. "That was a little stressful."  
  
You shrug. "Nah, it's fine. I did okay."  
  
"You did!" Takane leans backwards. "But I'm still allowed to worry."  
  
Well, she is. But you don't want her to be. "You are. And you're right to worry, but I think I'll be fine. That was not a bad first encounter."  
  
She looks away. A sudden gust of wind shakes the plain, rattles the scaffold and pushes the clouds sideways. She's really not sure about that.  
  
"Hey, hey." You kneel down beside her and scoot closer to her side. "At the very least I'm probably not gonna try linking with the witch anytime soon. That shit was weird."  
  
She shakes her head. "The witch was disrupted. I think it killed all its familiars, too."  
  
"Wait, what? What's a familiar?"  
  
She smiles. The sun gets a little brighter; you wonder if it's because she thinks you're cute or you're naive. "A familiar is a witch's helper. It's basically a proto-witch, and each barrier usually has dozens, or even hundreds of them. There _are_ witches without familiars, but they're rare."  
  
"So you think I somehow killed them all?"  
  
"Maybe..." she trails off as she looks down to your soul gem.  
  
You follow her line of sight, blink, and you pull the gem off of your chest. It's still glowing slightly red, little flecks of _something_ floating inside of it before they slow down and turn black. They settle at the bottom of your soul gem.  
  
"Huh." You blink. "I think I might've taken on a little bit of that witch's...uh..." you swallow, "...grief."  
  
That, of course, brings up the elephant in the room. You and Takane stare at the grief seed still in your left hand. That logo on the top looks an awful lot like...well...the top of a soul gem.  
  
You think you understand why your parents wanted to keep you away from the system.  
  
You understand it way too well.

[=]

  
Your name is Sayaka, and you're currently under the bridge between Kasamino and Mitakihara. Most of this part of the bridge is completely inaccessible to most people, and it's a few short leaps from...well...where you and Kyouko spent most of last night.  
  
You scratch your cheek and try to move to other thoughts, like how much as you enjoyed last night. You're on a maintenance rail, just outside a tiny little building that hangs ten meters away from the train. The train screams by, rattling the catwalk and causing your blazer to flutter in the wind.  
  
You have a red bean paste fish in your mouth. And as soon as you take a second bite, someone else hits the walkway.

  


  
  
His hair is hot-pink, his coat still fresh from the labs and smelling faintly of ozone. He's got a thin, long face, a bit gaunt, with a bit of stubble. He rubs his chin, scratching away at his cheek as he gives you a thin smile.  
  
You think he's still just happy to have _some_ stubble for once.  
  
"Hey," Yuki says.  
  
"Hey yourself." You lean back further. "Where you able to glean anything?"  
  
"Ahaha, fuck no."  
  
"How about theories? Got any theories?"  
  
"I mean, I got a few," he says with a shrug, "but it's pretty much all conjecture. I can't say much of anything concrete until I go to Kasamino tonight. Until then, all I have is speculation."  
  
"Well, speculate. What do you think?"  
  
He takes a breath. "I think that this 'Yuri' girl can pull magi from other timelines. That or she intentionally causes a paradox and summons infinite magi."  
  
You blink in surprise. "Oh. Which uh...which one's worse?"  
  
"They're both pretty bad, but the latter is way worse. And way less plausible. I mostly brought it up as a possibility." He waves his hand around. "Uhh, but yeah, I don't know the _limits_ of her specific power, and it can be, uh...basically anything, really."  
  
"That's not very specific at all."  
  
"Yeah, I told you; I don't have a lot to work with."

"Hrm." You cross your arms. "Well, not much else, then. Keep me posted as you head into Kasamino tonight."  
  
"Right, right." He takes another deep breath. "Shit, Sayaka. I don't want a war."  
  
"And I don't want my magi harmed. Rin's bad news and I don't want to see her do anything to them. If that means that she wants an all-out war, so fucking be it. I don't care what her goals are and I don't care what she wants. What I want to know is what she's capable of."  
  
"Well, sometimes, the goal informs capability." He waves his hand. "Fuck, worst case scenario, she's a nut _and_ a TERF."  
  
You snort at that. "So what you're saying is that we could be getting into a TERF war?"  
  
"Eyyy-" He shoots a pair of fingerguns your way. "That was fucking bad."  
  
"I'm a mom. Bad puns come with parenthood." You wave him off. "I'll regroup with you and the others in an hour."  
  
"Right, right." He takes a step off the balcony. "Later, Saya."  
  
"Later."  
  
With that, he falls over the edge. A split-second later, a hook arches up from underneath your vision, and he swings his way off back towards the boardwalk. You think he's going to nab a few snacks before the meetup. You turn back down the bridge to Kasamino. The train rumbles in the distance on its way to work.  
  
You can't help but feel like something terrible is coming. You don't know what it is, but you're damn well going to get ready for it.  
  


[=]

  
Your name is Kyouko, and you made ramen tonight. Perfectly cooked, custom-made, with noodles that you cut yourself, meat you cooked yourself, and a broth that you stirred yourself. You should be enjoying your meal; Minako loves the food that you and your wife cook. You kind of suspect that your love of food rubbed off on Sayaka.  
  
Except, well, you aren't eating much of it. You sat down at the table, and you already have the feeling that something's wrong.  
  
Minako is eating but they're looking distant. They stir the bowl with their chopsticks, and every so often they pick up the kale that sits at the bottom of the bowl. Then they let it slip out of the grip. Grab...slip. Grab...well this time, they bite into it. They close their eyes, then they greedily slurp the rest of it up into their mouth.  
  
Then they sit back down onto their hand. Grip. Slip. Grip. Slip.  
  
Sayaka's sitting next to you with her own bowl. She's eating slowly; painfully slowly. You know it's painful because usually she fucking inhales her food.  
  
You send a thought towards Sayaka. _'Hey, so Mina...'_  
  
You stop yourself mid-thought. That's right, Minako would _know_. Though to be completely honest, they probably knew way, way before they became a magi. At the very least, they knew that you and Sayaka were hiding shit and trying to be coy.  
  
So instead... _'You alright, Mina?'_  
  
They stir the soup around. _'Kinda? I think.'_ Their eyes flick up to you. "We can just talk, y'know."  
  
Well, now you just feel sheepish. "I didn't want you to stop eatin' just to talk."  
  
"I just...okay, so..." They take a breath. "Where do witches come from? Really. Truthfully. Be honest. Don't fucking lie to me. Because Takane and I have an...idea."  
  
Both you and Sayaka freeze in place. Your wife stopped eating her food as soon as Mina started speaking, and now, well...  
  
Well now you've completely lost your appetite.  
  
Minako's eyes flicker between the two of you. Your emotionscape must be hellish now. You don't know what that looks like but Mina _does._ Mina must be able to see it _vividly._  
  
"So witches come from Magi," they murmur.  
  
"It's a...major part of the Incubators' plans." Sayaka speaks for the first time in this conversation. "They consider being a magi to be a kind of larval state, with witches being the final metamorphosis. The endgoal is not to produce magi. A race of superpowered warriors that are fully capable of controlling their souls' energy and maybe even rebelling? That's not a system. To the Incubators, that's not even sustainable.  
  
"So what they want instead is a magi to make a contract, and for that magi to...to grow to regret it. Magi make a wish on an impulse or a whim or a belief. What usually happens is that, well, a magi is a teenager. They make that wish, but they don't consider the consequences or the results of that witch. Or they realize that...maybe they're nowhere near as virtuous as they thought, or..."  
  
Your wife trails off and turns towards you.  
  
You take that as your cue to continue the thought.  
  
"Or they get lucky. Very, very lucky. If a magi survives and doesn't witch out quickly, because usually it takes a month or two for a magi to witch, then they're usually killed by a witch or another, desperate magi. Grief seeds are scarce. Scarcity drives conflict and competition. Competition as a magi gets people killed or witches them out. New grief seeds. Grief seeds are still scarce. Etc etc etc rinse and fuckin' repeat."  
  
Minako stares at the both of you. Their eyes close shut. "Shit."  
  
"Yeah it is, kid."  
  
Silence reigns at the dinner table. There's not a whole lot else that can be said right now. You tap your fingers against the table, the cushion underneath suddenly feeling way less comfy. You slowly put some more noodles in your mouth.  
  
"No wonder you didn't want me to...uh...yeah..." They laugh a little, but they can't even look at the two of you right now.  
  
"Yeah." Sayaka closes her eyes. "It's no wonder."  
  
Another awkward, terrible silence. Minako is eating properly now; they're still not really enjoying their food, instead glancing between the two of you, trying to wait for something else to say or for you to say something.  
  
You keep your eyes on your wife, who stares back.  
  
You really were hoping to avoid this part. Nobody has a good reaction to that particular bomb. It's almost never a good idea. Practice tells you it's a bad idea; it demotivates magi, it makes them feel hopeless and destroys morale. Most of the magi in your city don't know, and for good reason. Anyone who's lasted as long as you have in this godforsaken system _knows_ how bad an idea it is to tell someone about the true nature of witches.  
  
You take another scoop of noodles and put it in your mouth. You have a little more to talk about with Mina after dinner now. None of it _good,_ mind you, but important nonetheless.

You and Sayaka finish eating dinner, and as the awkwardness dies down, hunger comes right back. What starts as a slow meal turns quick because, well, you still gotta eat. Your kid feels terrible, but they're eating fast. You have nothing left to do but kinda move on.  
  
When the meal's done, you lean back. Sayaka coughs into her fist. "Uhh, I'll take care of the bowls."  
  
You smile at her as she pulls them off the table. "Thanks, Saya."  
  
This leaves you and Minako, who's sitting right to your left. You sigh. "Does your power work on witches?"  
  
They smile a little. "Yeah. It does. It's...weird? I mean, like, it links up with _people,_ so why wouldn't it link up with witches. But it, like, uh..." They scrunch their face, visibly racking their brain. "...it uh...it acts like a bad jpeg?"  
  
"It acts like it's deep fried?"  
  
"No, no, not like that. More like it's corrupted. Like things are misplaced; the witch's labyrinth breaks apart and grinds to a halt? There weren't even any familiars after that."  
  
You stare at them. "Huh. Well, what does it do to _you_?"  
  
"I mean, uh, just _being_ in that barrier made me angry. Like I saw red and it was more red than the barrier. Like I was angry at _nothing._ It was low-key angry energy at everything. And when I first did it on the witch, it fucked with my head something fierce. I saw a screaming face and it almost sounded like a _language."_  
  
"That reminds me of a witch I fought a while back," Sayaka says from behind the sink. "A witch tried talking to me. I killed it before it could say more." She scratches her cheek "I was in a bad way."  
  
"Yeah, there are a few like that. They hang on just enough to form words."  
  
Minako nods. "This was...this was closer to a sentence? Or a paragraph."  
  
Sayaka clenches her teeth. You can hear them grinding from over here. "Please don't do it again."  
  
Minako freezes at the words, but you suspect it's more related to their powers. They glance up at Sayaka. "I'm sorry. I couldn't help it. I'm still just...trying to do better."  
  
Sayaka breathes in through her nose as she realizes very quickly that Minako can definitely feel that horror. That quiet terror that she's keeping clamped down under the surface. She breathes out. "We'll train tomorrow. Part of it is combat, part of it is understanding more of your power. I'll be there."  
  
"I gotta patrol the north end of town," you say with a smile, "but we can go out later. Maybe see a movie? I mean, I've met your girlfriend, but I've never actually...y'know, talked to her. I think we'd get along."  
  
Your kid gives you a thin smile. "I...yeah, sure. I'd be cool with that. I-I mean both the hangout and the...the uh...the training."  
  
You lean over. "We'll get through it. I ain't sure of it, but we'll do our damnedest to get through it."


	6. Big God

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A stranger finds her God.

"Her name is Sayaka Miki-Sakura. And her wife is Kyouko."

  
You take a shocked step backwards. The words hit you like a punch to the ribs. You feel your heart beat in your chest. Your breathing gets heavy, low and fast.  
  
Rin stops gliding and turns to face you. She's noticed your weakness. How _pitiful_ you are. "Are you alright, Miss Tomoe?"  
  
Your eyes grow wide. You recoil at the name. "S-Sayaka? Sayaka's a _tyrant?_ A-and with Kyouko..."  
  
Sweet, sweet Sayaka? That naive student of yours, who believes in a justice that you scorned, and a magical system that you tried to keep her from. _That_ Sayaka?  
  
Rin pauses before you. Her eyes flicker downwards to the concrete floor, then she gives you a sad smile. "A lot changes in twenty years. And in our world, she rules Mitakihara with her wife. And I believe you know her."  
  
Your hammering heart screeches to a stop in your chest. Your breathing slows. The name echoes in your mind. Kyouko. _Kyouko._ Kyouko Sakura. Your friend. Your beloved friend. The last you saw of her was her soul gem turning _pitch-black,_ and...  
  
Your hands shake by your sides. Your teeth grind against each other. You still remember it vividly, and you really don't want to. The day you learned the truth about the Incubators. The day your world shattered. The day you had to find yourself again.  
  
The day you lost _her._  
  
Rin smiles. "Ah, Kyouko is alive and well in this timeline. Trapped under the thumb of her tyrannical wife. She is brainwashed by Sayaka. Forced into a marriage and with a daughter that she wasn't expecting. Oh, she believes she loves Sayaka. She does so desperately want to believe that she loves her wife, that her wife loves her back..."  
  
It takes all of your willpower not to scream into the night. Not to bury your face in your hands and cry and just let the world take you. Your soul gem flickers. Grief threatens to dim it, just a sliver in the bottom, but you know how quickly it can fill when you're like this.  
  
Kyouko is _alive._ You felt something for her. You didn't know if it was...friendship or something else entirely. But she's alive and, well...  
  
[Trapped.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kIrRooQwuk)  
  
You breathe in through your nose. Your fingers are digging into your palms. Even with your ability to deaden pain you can feel it clawing through, feel it digging into the bone. You look up. "Is she truly tyrannical? Sayaka...there's no way that _Sayaka-"_  
  
"Sayaka has already taken some magical girls away from us." Rin turns to look into the sky, sighs wistfully. "Uriko. Yuuko. Henrietta. She cleared out Tokyo's magi, too. It was how she acquired a taste for blood and power."  
  
The name strikes a chord. "Wait, _the Six?"_ You stare. "She killed the _Six?"_  
  
"Single-handedly." Rin nods. "Perhaps it started in self-defense. But time has warped it into something else entirely."  
  
You don't want it to be true. But she...she doesn't seem like she's lying. This woman looks you in the eyes. She believes what she's saying with all her heart, she _must_. She named the girls that she sent over, the ones that Sayaka...  
  
Sayaka _murdered._  
  
You have to resist the urge to vomit onto the street. You put your trust into her. You put your faith into her. You taught her. And she used that to take advantage of the girl that you...  
  
Kyouko, who you...  
  
Kyouko who didn't deserve what she got. Who didn't deserve what fate gave her. No matter where she is, she still suffers, doesn't she? She still suffers, and leaves you alone.  
  
You don't deserve anyone else. Why would you. You failed your friend. You failed her so hard that she suffers even in an entirely different world.  
  
You're so lost in your own thoughts that you don't notice when Rin drifts across the table. You don't notice when she gives you a hug, when she squeezes you tight.  
  
"You're not alone," she whispers into your ear. "You don't have to be alone in your revelations, and trust me when I say that I've been where you are."  
  
She pulls herself back, and you can stare into her eyes.

  


They're glimmering silver, with a supernatural cosmic hue. Her pupils are like staring into the Milky Way itself. It's too deep, too blue, too beautiful. You feel a pain in your heart, and for a second you wonder if you could be so easily swayed.  
  
"I...I'm..."  
  
"You don't even need to if you don't want to. I definitely didn't expect this to get so personal." She smiles. "But if you so desire, I can send you over posthaste. Just a few short days from now, you can reverse the worst of Sayaka's damages. You can undo her evils. And after all that?"  
  
She smiles. Your heart aches again. "Y-you won't leave me after all of that, will you?"  
  
"No. I would never."  
  
Rin means it.  
  
She means it.  
  
She has to.  
  
You smile. "Then...then I...I won't be alone anymore."  
  
Rin smiles. Her eyes glow. Silver turns to white, her hair shines, her wings explode from her back. You feel _euphoric._ You can't help crying as you see the world around your soul gem turn from golden yellow to shimmering white then black then yellow.  
  
"No. No you won't. Not when you bask in my _Glow,_ Mami Tomoe."  
  
She cups your chin, then your soul gem as she presses her fingers into your forehead.  
  
Your name is Mami Tomoe. You are twenty years out of time.  
  
And you've found a place that loves you.  
  


[=]

  
Your name is Sayaka. And right now, you stand at the edge of town, this time with Akane and Tomo. Kyouko is off on her patrol, and you're currently waiting for Minako. You have plenty of time to plan out your training for today.  
  
So you should probably figure out what to work on. You're leaning against a nearby wall in a tank-top and a clipboard. You tap your pen against your cheek.  
  
Akane leans over with a loose hoodie over her shoulders. She was on a city-wide jog, and after finishing her fifth lap in an hour, she finally hopped over to the training grounds. Tomo followed soon after with her own parkour run back and forth across town, and she's got her hair tied behind her head. She sports a cropped jacket and a white t-shirt.  
  
"So we're training your kid?" Akane mutters. "Shit, Sayaka."  
  
You take a deep, deep breath. "Yeah, well, they contracted. Not much else but to try and keep them safe. Or, at least, _safer."_ You click your tongue. "Their girlfriend clued me in on their weapon and moveset. Mina's like their mother."  
  
Tomo grimaces. "In temperament or-"  
  
"Yes." You stick your tongue out. "But I was talking about their weapon and powerset. They hit hard and they hit often. Their bat extends into a barbed wire monstrosity with spikes and blades."  
  
Akane whistles. "Snazzy. Let's hope they don't try and use those blades on me."  
  
You sigh. "So, who wants to handle what?"  
  
The two women glance at each other, then they turn right back to you.  
  
"I mean, honestly?" Tomo crosses her arms. "They're your kid."  
  
Akane nods. "It doesn't feel right for us to pick. Mina's sweet and I love them but it's just, uh..."  
  
You sigh. "No, no, I get it."

"Alright," you say, pointing at Tomo, "you're gonna help them handle their power in cleverer ways."  
  
She nods. "What's their power?"  
  
"They're an empath. It's not really related to how you handle your speed buut-"  
  
"Lateral thinking. Got it."  
  
You turn your head to Akane. "You'll spar with Mina."  
  
"You sure about that? I mean-"  
  
"I am. I know you can pull your punches when you need to and I trust you with that. What's _important_ is that you're _terrifying_." You can't help but smirk a little. "Mina's only sparred with their girlfriend for now. Someone like you is a wake-up call and a reminder not to relax."  
  
She shrugs. "Hey, makes sense."  
  
"And I'll help them manage their grief. I mean, my pool's grown, but I still had to manage it a _lot_ while I was younger." You turn around to face the city. In the distance you see a brief glimmer of purple among the buildings. Your kid's jumping on their way here right now.  
  
A few more minutes pass before they finally bound their way up the hill and hit the cliff face. Their shoe hits the edge, and the momentum carries them just enough to have them step onto the ground in front of you, their hands in their pockets.  
  
"Uh, hi!" They wave their hand as they see you, Akane,, and Tomo. "So, uh...what's the-"  
  
"You're going with Tomo first." You point to Tomo right behind you. "She'll help you figure out your power. After that, I'll teach you corruption management, and then you'll spar Akane."  
  


[=]

  
Your name is Minako, and training goes by pretty fast with Tomo and your mom.  
  
Tomo tells you about secondary abilities and how all magical abilities have other uses and techniques and extra properties. Her ability is about speed, so that means not only can she _move_ faster, she can also reload quickly, increase the speed at which her crossbow can fire. She also brings up how her crossbow used to be pretty slow to fire.  
  
Then she transformed it into a magazine-fed rapid-fire crossbow. It fires as fast as an assault rifle and reloads about as fast, too. This is _before_ she enhances it with her innate magical powers.  
  
This also leads you to thinking about how you can abuse your own powers. There's probably something interesting you can do about that...  
  
"So do you think I could predict someone's moves?"  
  
"Probably. At the very least you can figure out intent. I think that'd be useful. Because you said it just senses their emotional state in a split second, right?"  
  
Tomo's emotional state is a furnished house, sitting upon the ruins of a burnt-out husk. Smoke still rises past the windows into a sky of concrete clouds. The windows of the house glow with life and conversation, and the sounds of indistinct whispering fills your mind.  
  
The house rattles a little before a single figure just stares out the window, as though interested.  
  
"Yeah, I'm curious about it, too." You glance at Akane.  
  
"Heh." She smiles. "Yo, Saya! You're up!"  
  
Your mom is next. This training session is a bit less easy to digest, because, well, it's a more abstract concept.  
  
And it's also your mom. The first few minutes are just her discussing the general concepts. Namely since, well, you now know what's at stake if you let your grief get too high. That part you could infer.  
  
But what's interesting is what comes next.  
  
"There's something I've noticed about witches. It's not enough to just have a soul gem turn black with grief. You can have your gem at the edge of witching for a _while_ until it goes out. But a magi will witch the _second_ that they give up. They can have moments of weakness when their gem is clear, but when their soul gem turns black, a magi's emotional state will tank. And they become more susceptible to the kind of thoughts that lead to witching out."  
  
"So what you're saying is that at the edge it's...not really the end immediately?"  
  
"Right. But you're better off never hitting that point."  
  
You suck air in through your teeth. "I...yeah. Yeahh..."  
  
"Oh, and one more thing." Your mom pulls a soul gem off of her finger and forms it in her hand. It's a pristine sky blue, with only a thin smattering of black specks at the bottom. "It is possible for your soul gem to darken frighteningly quickly. If you experience some kind of trauma, if you lose a loved one, if you're having an...episode."  
  
You wince.  
  
"Yeah...yeah, I got it."  
  
"Being a magi is mostly manageable. But your mental health is just as important as keeping yourself safe in combat. If you need it, your mama and I will help you find a therapist. There is no shame in seeking help."  
  
What's next is a fight against Akane.  
  
And it goes about as well as you expected it to. You don't even get close to getting a hit in. You definitely read her mindset during the fight; you do so frequently, but knowing what she is about to do or what she is inclined to do doesn't matter when you have _no idea_ how to get around it.  
  
Or, worse, when you're too scared to get past it. You try to go in for a bat swing and she blocks your attack. You swing the bat's whip mode and she snaps her fingers, knocks it out of your hand without even touching it before giving you a light tap on the back.  
  
This happens five times. Each time, you end up face-down in the dirt.  
  
After the sixth time, you crumble against the ground, dead tired. Akane stands over you, her gauntlets by her side, legs bent. You're in the center of a crater. She's at the edge, looking you over with a grunt. "You alright, kid?"  
  
_"Nefr...betrrntgh..."_  
  
She winces. "I...I uh...I think that's enough training for today."

You shake your head. "No, no, I ain't done yet!" You stumble to your feet. "I uh...I'll fight uh..." You wave your finger to Akane.  
  
She just winces.  
  
"Okay uhhhh, Tomo." You move your finger across the plain, right to Tomo. "Yeah, Tomo."  
  
Tomo sighs. "You sure about that, kid?" She stands upright. A clip flicks around in her hands, and you can hear crossbow bolts faintly jangling around in the tin. "Like, I'm not an easier fight-"  
  
"No, but I can figure _something_ out!" You spit on the ground. "I'm good. I can do it."  
  
Tomo takes a breath. She glances to your mom, who looks a little worried. Oh, no, that's a lie, she looks nervous as fuck as she takes a step back. The house in her emotionscape is clamped shut, with metal shutters clanking into place as the figures inside lock themselves down and prepare for war.  
  
She flutters her fingers around, then takes the clip in her hand and slams it hard into the base of an invisible crossbow. The weapon flashes into existence, sailing upwards with the momentum, before she grabs the stock with her right hand.  
  
She pulls it back, and then from the crossbow comes her glove, then a padded shouldercape. The crossbow fully forms mid-swing, and the strings rattle as the entire weapon hits her shoulder. Her cuirass drops over her chest as though knocking the crossbow down gave her full armor, and a series of segments drop over her stomach. Metal laces itself over her arms, over her elbows and down her legs.  
  
Finally, the waistcape flutters into existence, and her soul gem flashes in front of her neck before the gorget _clanks_ into existence around her neck.

  


"You first," she says. "You make a move, and I react."  
  
You laugh. "Ahaha, _no."_ You jump back a few feet with your bat already in front of you. You were able to last a little bit longer by keeping this _in front_ of you as opposed to off to the side or over your shoulder. "Nonono, I ain't doing that again."  
  
Tomo smiles. "Alright, good. Then that's a good step. I used to launch myself face-first into problems all the time." She smiles. "But you can't just be reactive, you also have to be proactive. You have to make moves that are surprising, th-"  
  
You unlink your bat and _whip_ it across the field. The thing wraps around her forearm, each of the blades _clack-clack-clacking_ around the armor. She smiles as she keeps her hand wide open, clearly struggling against your grip.  
  
You widen your stance as she holds her hand up, ready to pull her right off-balance and into the dirt, where you can get a nice hit in.  
  
She smiles. "That took me off-guard. You definitely had the proactive part down, but you have a while yet before you get-" she raises her hand, "- _surprising!"_  
  
She whips her entire body around faster than you can blink. Your vice-like grip on your bat's handle turns out to be a curse as you're yanked off of your feet. The tips of your boots drag across the ground as you try to get some kind of traction.  
  
A read of her emotions. The figure in the house shoots a fingergun while making "pew pew" sounds and you _let go_ of the bat.  
  
She whips around and fires, only to realize quickly that you're not where she was intending you to be. You feel smug for all of half a second before she just fires _more shots_ right towards you. You make a new bat with your left hand and _bat_ the bolts out of the air.  
  
You have a few seconds to watch her reload, and you _need_ to close that distance. You push yourself forward, your boots ripping into the grass and dirt underneath, and you keep your bat in front of you as you charge right towards Tomo.  
  
Except she's already done reloading by the time you're even just a meter ahead. She fires again and you block the shot. You block the next, then the next, but you don't block the fourth. A blunt crossbow bolt smashes into your finger and you instinctively let go of the bat in surprise.  
  
You blink as the bat falls out of your vision, and you don't even get to scream in surprise as Tomo's in front of your face with a single fist speeding right towards your midsection. She doesn't even move; momentum does the job for her as you _slam_ into her fist, as spittle flies out of your mouth and the wind is knocked out of your lungs.  
  
She pulls her fist away and you immediately just collapse to your knees. "You didn't do bad, but you still need to figure out how to block more consistently."  
  
Your mom slowly walks right to your side. "Hey, hey Mina, you okay?"  
  
"I-I'm _f-f-fine!"_ You wince, before you block off the pain. You shake your head and force yourself to your feet. "Fuckin' _A,_ you hit hard."  
  
"Of course I do." Tomo flexes her fingers. "You got a ways to go, Mina, but we're gonna do our best to get you there."  
  
Your mom brushes the dust off of you and puts her hand on your shoulder. "That was kind of extreme, Tomo."  
  
"It kind of wasn't. I don't hold back on my own trainees." She narrows her eyes. "Look, your kid's gonna need it, too."  
  
"I...hrm." Your mom's teeth grind against each other. You can hear it from how close you are, and a quick read of her emotionscape shows an ocean that shakes. A quiet ripple of water rips across the surface before it slowly settles.  
  
In the real world, she takes a breath. "Right. Right, shit."  
  
"Yeah, it's hard having to train your kid." Akane walks past you and pats you on the back. "And again, don't feel bad. Your girlfriend _still_ hasn't beat me yet."  
  
You still look away. "Hmmm...right. Right." You flick your eyes downwards. "I think...I'm gonna go ahead and talk to her about that later."  
  
Akane nods, then turns right to your mom. "Oh, uh, it's been a little while since we did anything non-magi related, so if you wanna-"  
  
"Yeah I'd love a drink," your mom interrupts.  
  
"Tomorrow evening?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
It's probably something your mom could use. But right now? You have a date to go to. Hopefully your stomach'll stop feeling this bad by the time you head over.

**Author's Note:**

> A thank you to both: https://twitter.com/icasttrish and https://twitter.com/novicewordsmith for helping to edit this story together! Without them it would not have been nearly as effective as it (hopefully) is.
> 
> Easy to Find was actually originally posted on Sufficient Velocity as a quest! It was completed earlier in August 2020. The votes have already been filled in and completed, and I will be posting it daily. I hope you like several months of posts.
> 
> You can read the original in its entirety here: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/easy-to-find-sayakaquest-2.54887/


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